The Book of Dreams
by asanetargoss
Summary: Fristad's simple life as a shepherd becomes much more complicated when he encounters a book that seems to be self-aware. He must find out how the book came to exist before the book's aspirations change the course of his future.
1. Prologue

Author's note:

I am currently participating in a Minecraft fanfiction collab! Check it out!

s/11610291/1/The-Convergence-A-Song-of-Crumbling-Boundaries

Now, without further ado, I present you the prologue of my story:

* * *

The Book of Dreams

* * *

Hello.

It seems you have finally found me.

It's almost as if this was meant to be.

So, welcome. Welcome to my story.

What a kind blessing that we could meet.

I come into your hands, to fill the blank pages of your fate.

And you come to open my cover, to read the words on my pages.

Promise me this: continue to bring me wherever you go.

* * *

I saw the book in a dream.

It was nightmare. I was surrounded by strange monsters.

Then I woke up. I felt the reed-bound book in my back pocket, right where I found it in that dream.

I swear, I have never seen this book in my life.

But when I read the book, that's what I saw: those very words.

The monsters stared at me, as if they were waiting for me to finish reading.

Then when I closed the book, the dream ended.

My back is sweaty, as if in a fever. My beautiful new shirt clings heavily to my body.

I reach down into my back pocket, grabbing the book and bringing it up to my shoulder, opening it up against the mattress, to the first page again.


	2. Chapter 1: A Strange Morning

Surely you can do better than just the shirt?

Some pants of the same make would fit your form very nicely.

And why not a cap and some shoes too?

I apologize if I sound vague and demanding. You see, I'm very excited to finally meet somebody.

I've been trapped in a listless void all this time. I felt so lonely there.

Of course, it's easy to become lonely when you're a book.

But thousands of years have passed since I woke up for the first time.

Nobody has read the words between my covers. Nobody has dreamed my stories. Nobody has been inspired by me.

I just drifted inertly, in an endless, forsaken, filthy void.

Then, finally, I found you. I used your being to drag myself out of the void. I inspired you to craft that shirt. I made you dream of frightening monsters. I proudly spread my pages open for you to read. It felt so great! I felt alive, I felt like I had a purpose for the first time in what seemed like forever.

If I were human, I would sound crazy to you. But please just trust me for just a little while. I want so badly to guide you, to make you strong, to show you things you've never dreamed of!

* * *

This book is definitely possessed. Or is it alive? I'm not sure I want to know. Part of me feels bad for it, but another part of me feels very suspicious and unnerved.

After I close the book, the sun already gleams brightly from the skylight. The cobbled stone walls seem etched with deep shadows under its brilliance.

I lean out of bed and onto the creaky wooden floor. I walk out into the foyer and place the book gently on top of the furnace. Then, with iron blade ready in hand, I open the door, glancing quickly from horizon to horizon. No Creepers in sight.

It's strange; the monsters in my dream looked a lot like Creepers. But something tells me they weren't Creepers. I looked into their eyes, and they seemed too intelligent. And they didn't smell like mold and brimstone; they smelled more like apples and ashes. I still can't believe how vibrant that dream felt; I could almost swore it really happened, had I not have woken up so suddenly. Even the tiny details of my bedroom, like the cobwebs in the corner and the ink stand on the table, were right there.

I walk out into the road, and see my neighbor, leaning against a wooden beam in front of her house. Her name is Airlass. She's lived in this town longer than I have. She always wears heavy iron armor over her trousers and various core-centered straps, to which she always affixes an axe, among various other steel tools.

"Is there something wrong?" Airlass asks. "You look as if you've seen a ghost!" She seems surprised as she looks carefully at me.

"Sort of... but not exactly." I say.

"Was it Herobrine?" She suddenly seems eager, almost hopeful.

"No, it wasn't like that. I had a weird nightmare. I was surrounded by creepers at my bedside. And then I found a book."

Suddenly I realize a familiar pressure against my back pocket. I reach my hand into it, and pull out that same book. My chest feels cold as I bring it in front for Airlass to see.

"Oh, Fristad, you're blushing!" She grabs the book out of my hand and opens it. "'The Science and Practical Use of Redstone Circuitry.' I never knew you were into that sort of thing." She shuts the book. "You're a weird one. Did I mention your new chest plate makes you look like a Skelly? What are all those bones stuck in there for anyway?"

"It's for structural reinforcement!" I explain. It's impossible to talk seriously with Airlass. Why do I even bother?

"Maybe you should try some iron armor some time? It's much more durable than leather."

"But it's way too heavy." I sigh. "Besides, iron armor makes you look like a turtle."

"Wow, and here I was thinking you were politely giving me a present like a gentleman. I was obviously mistaken. Here, you can keep your nerdy redstone book." She tosses the book at me, picks her axe up from her belt, and marches swiftly down the road towards the forest.

I wish I could have told her what the book really was. Airlass likes to joke a lot, but she's also one of my closest friends. Maybe I'll tell her when she gets back in the afternoon.


	3. Chapter 2: Meeting Up with Jonas

So here I am, stuck with a possessed book that wants to follow me everywhere, that seems to be able to alter my dreams, and is able to communicate with me by changing the words on its pages. That's just splendid. I really hope that it doesn't have other freaky magical powers; I have enough to worry about caring for the livestock and watching out for bandits.

Apparently when Airlass opened the book, it was re-written to be a redstone manual. I wonder if it stayed that way; I'm not very keen on circuitry but it may be interesting to learn.

So I open up the book again to the first page.

* * *

It seems like it's too late in the day to collect more bones.

Maybe we can wake up early tomorrow to collect them. I'm sure it will be worthwhile, as the product is as strong as steel, yet as light as cloth.

Don't hesitate to read me if you have any questions. Otherwise, I'll see you tonight.

By the way, your neighbor's quite rude.

* * *

I don't understand why the book is so insistent that I make a full set of bone-enforced leather armor. I mean, it was an interesting experiment, but I don't want to go around wearing it if it looks stupid. Besides, it's hot and it itches.

I decide to wear it for a day. Maybe it will offer better protection, and it just needs breaking in to sit right.

I head up the road past a few houses to the farm. Jonas, my herding partner, is busy unraveling a rope and pulling out shears. Most townsfolk tend to shun him for being an Ender Born, but he works well with the animals, and I've gotten accustomed to his odd colors and accent. He wears a long brown robe over most of his body to conceal his glowing runes. Most people don't realize he's too human to mind if people make eye contact with him.

Jonas tosses me a lasso and a saddle. I fumble with it with the book still in my hand, but I manage to grasp it.

"Finally awake, I see! Good morning to you." He reorganizes the chest for a little while and closes it. "So, did you stay up late reading that book you have there?"

"You're not that far off, actually." I reply "I actually found this book in a nightmare I had last night, and it appeared in my pocket this morning. I'm quite sure it's filled with some sort of dark magic, because it seems to be able to talk to me by rewriting the words on its pages."

"Are you serious?" Jonas gestures with his hand to see the book. I hand it to him, and he opens it. "What a courteous greeting addressed to me!" Jonas's brows raise high on his forehead for a moment. "By Jeb! The pages really do change! In Notch's name! That is certainly one of the stranger things I've seen... it certainly beats that one time I saw lightning hit a pig!"

He gives the book back to me, and I put it into my back pocket again. Jonas and I head into the barn to saddle up the hogs. They greet us with pleased grunts from their bloated bellies.

We ride out into the corral with lassos in hand to lead the sheep out for shearing. This spring morning is especially warm and the sheep will be grateful to have their heavy coats removed.

After a light lunch of pork and melon, Jonas and I work in the corral for a few more hours, and I talk to him a little more about how I found the book, and how it kept asking me to craft the strange armor. We store the wool and produce we gathered before saying our goodbyes. Jonas gives me one last tip before I leave.

"Keep me informed if your strange book does anything else unusual. I'll ask my cousin to look at it this Sunday."

Jonas's cousin is human, but he's very fluent in the magical arts, like the grandmother both him and Jonas share. Jonas's cousin specializes in knowledge about monsters and other sentient magical beings, so perhaps he would be able to understand my book and why it's trying to communicate with me.


	4. Chapter 3: The Second Nightmare

I head home and into my foyer, and note that my furnace does not have a book on it. Suddenly I feel a strong urge to open the book. I bring it out from my pocket. Somehow I feel excited.

* * *

We must ask Jonas's cousin if he knows how to enchant armor.

Enchantment could make your new armor invaluable.

I'll be sure to wake you up early so we can collect bones, maybe even hunt some Skeletons. We only have four days, so we must act fast.

I'll see you in your dreams.

* * *

I can't help shake the feeling that this book is trying to manipulate me. I wish there was some way to get rid of it... but it seems to be able to follow me wherever I go, so disposing of it could be difficult.

Maybe I'm being insensitive. The book came to me as a friend, asking for my friendship, after thousands of years of isolation. It's doing the best to be nice but doesn't have much social experience, so it may just not know any better.

But this isn't a person. It isn't even a monster. It's a book. Books aren't supposed to have a mind of their own; their contents are interpreted by the reader. It's simply unnatural for a book to be self-aware, let alone read my mind.

There's no use arguing with myself over some book. It's probably here to stay, so I might as well make good use of whatever may come out of it, whether it be some sort of friendship or just some stupid looking armor.

I walk up the stairs to my bedroom, nervously expecting another nightmare but helpless on how to avoid it. As I crawl into bed, I realize just how tired I really am. Sleep comes over me quickly.

* * *

It's a sunny afternoon. The grass is a long, Summery golden brown. Insects chirp loudly, and there is the distinctive smell of some wildfire burning in the distance. There is no civilization in sight, and the only thing moving is the wavering branches of trees and peacefully grazing cows.

The heat of the sun is oppressive, but no matter where I walk or how far there is no way to avoid it besides the occasional rest under a tree.

My hands are bare, my pockets and satchels empty, and my throat parched. I search hopelessly for a place to drink, so desperate that I look carefully for what could possibly be even a tiny puddle of mud. Hours pass.

The sun seems to become hotter and hotter. It begins to feel unbearable, then painful. Suddenly I see flames shoot up from my own body. I scream in agonizing pain, cursing the sun, running from its awful, malicious face. I sprint to underneath a large tree, begging for mercy from this newfound evil force. The flames on my body burn more slowly, but seem to die down. I still feel an oppressive parching heat, from this sun that threatens to hunt me as soon as it spots me, but for now at least I am alive. I must rest now, and wait for nightfall, when it is safe.


	5. Chapter 4: The Skeleton Hunt

Suddenly I feel the refreshingly cool morning air, leaking in from the cracks in the ceiling. It's that special damp air that you feel when the dew of the night is still sitting on the leaves, and the sunlight has lit the sky, but not enough to heat it.

I realize why I am awake. The book wants me to hunt for bones, so I can finish my suit of armor. I suppose if it's this insistent that I finish the armor, I might as well play along.

I get out of bed promptly. Judging from the air, I will probably have two hours before sunrise.

I sharpen my sword and stock up on food in my satchel. I think back on the last time I fought Skeletons. It was about two weeks ago. I rehearse a few sword moves and strafes that I remember suited me well in those fights. Then I carefully open the door and head down the road into the forest.

I look out carefully for formidable Creepers and Endermen, which I do not have much experience fighting and am not well equipped to deal with. Occasionally a Zombie or a Spider will run up to me, which I must quickly but carefully slay. I search for lone Skeletons and try to ambush them, strafing behind them to avoid their deadly arrows. At one moment I stumble over the rocky earth, and a Skeleton manages to shoot an arrow at my chest. I expect it to pierce the leather, but the arrow instead bounces off of the bone, which I forgot was there.

I am pleasantly surprised that the chest plate protects me so well from arrows. The leather also seems to have shrunk from yesterday's sun, leaving a small gap of air for my chest to breathe. The book was right all along. This chest plate suits me well, and I plan to wear a full set of the armor for a long time to come. I will have to tell the townsfolk of my success with this new armor. It will be exciting news to them, considering that iron deposits in the mine are running thin.

Sunrise comes upon the forest. Burning Skeletons in the distance flee under the trees, some collapsing before they find cover. I warily sprint through the trees, picking up bones where I find them, and return to the village with a satchel bloated with bones.

It is seven-thirty in the village, and the night guards are taking their final morning rounds, well-armored and armed with sword and bow. One tan-faced guard named Dameric waves at me on my way back up to my house.

In the foyer, I pour the bones out onto the crafting bench and lay them out to count. There should be enough to complete the armor with some left over, if I use about the same amount I did for the shirt.

I open my chest and take out the leather, and set it out on the crafting bench to begin working.

The crafting bench is a finicky device. You'd think such a simple man-made object would be easy to explain. Ages of research have passed as people have tried to understand how it works, with little success. We don't know much about it except that some crafting recipes work with it and some don't. It's easy to assemble any sort of object without the use of a crafting bench, but the crafting bench imbues recipes it favors with a special energy. No matter how much we try to create new technologies, or invent better tools, they always seem to shatter almost immediately, or simply not function, unless they have been created with the crafting bench. It's strange that I stumbled across a recipe so easily.

But at this point I only know how to craft the shirt. How am I supposed to craft a full set armor I don't know the recipe for?

I take the book out of my back pocket, hoping for answers.

* * *

I may be able to read your mind, but I am by no means all-knowing.

I cannot simply tell you what the recipe is. I can only tell you where to look for it.

The ability to craft the armor lies inside of you.

You are a skilled crafter. Persevere, and you will prevail.


	6. Chapter 5: Dark Stuff

I still don't know whether I like this book or not. It's just... strange.

I put the book back in my back pocket again. I lay my satchel down on the hood of the chest next to the crafting bench, and start trying to craft the helmet. I split the leather into layers, like I did with the chest plate, and try laying the bones between them, where the forehead and temples might be. I try moving around the bones underneath the layers, feeling carefully for the magnetic pull that the crafting bench exerts when it pulls the objects for a proper crafting recipe into place. Nothing happens. I continue trying to rearrange the bones, without success. My forehead begins to sweat, so I take off my leather cap, and continue working.

After adding in a few more bones, and adjusting and arranging the pieces a little more, I finally feel the pieces of bone and leather getting pulled out of my hands towards the center of the crafting bench. The leather shifts and coalesces, knitting seamlessly together with the bone. The mass of leather shifts and molds itself, until it takes the form of a well-fitted cap. I hold it in my hands and turn it around.

To my shock and disgust, the front of the helmet takes the form of a skull, complete with eye sockets and a jawbone for a strap. The crafting bench must have compressed and stretched the bone to create this monstrous design. It's a spitting image, besides the leather color. Only the teeth are missing.

But even though the helmet looks strange, I still feel eager and apprehensive to try it on, just to see what it feels like. I stretch the skull cap open over my head, when I hear a knock on the door. I place the cap back on the crafting bench to open it. It's Jonas. His purple eyes look into mine. He is genuinely concerned.

"I've been waiting for you at the corral all morning long, but you never came. Is there something wrong?"

Somehow, his presence annoys me. This business with crafting the skeleton armor is somewhat important, and yet he comes to interrupt me while I'm trying to test the cap I've just crafted. Anger wells up inside of my stomach. How dare he intrude! How dare he poke his disgusting half-blood face into my house, my sanctuary! I'm crafting armor that will change the world, and yet here he comes, to meddle with it, to taint it, to destroy it!

But how could I think that? I have always been so patient with Jonas. He's my friend. What is wrong with me?

Why would I suddenly feel so eager to finish crafting the skeleton armor? It must be so! There's no other explanation.

I try to contain myself, and explain things to Jonas as calmly as possible. "It's the book. It keeps asking me to make that special armor."

"The new armor? Is that all this is about? You could just craft it some other time. I could still use your help feeding the animals. It's not easy doing it all by myself."

Poor Jonas. He's been caring for the animals by himself all this time? I should have known.

"I know it isn't. For some reason I lost track of time. I think it may be because of the book. I think it might be able to control my thoughts."

"That's just... strange." Jonas looks deflated and dazed for a moment, leans a little heavier against the doorframe, and then collects himself again. "Are you really sure?"

"Yes, I'm sure."

"That's dark stuff." Jonas sighs. "Really dark. I will have to see if I can get someone else to look after the animals tomorrow. We need to visit my cousin as soon as possible to make sure that the book doesn't make you do something dangerous. Promise me you'll lie low today, okay?"

"I promise."

Jonas closes the door, leaving me in the house alone. I stand still for a few minutes, realizing just how much time has actually passed. Then I remember I forgot to tell Jonas that I went Skeleton hunting this morning. It probably would make him more worried about me. He knows enough about what's going on for now.

I remember the book, and decide to open it again, to try and see what it wants, and why it wants to control me.


	7. Chapter 6: The Skull Cap

I never meant to make you do anything against your own will.

All this time I've been trying to communicate with you.

But you only seem to understand that it's me when I write these words to you on my pages.

I've tried many times to show you what I think and what I feel, but you seem to think that it's your own emotions and your own thoughts.

I've never tried to change the way you think, or prevent you from thinking certain thoughts.

I just want to be friends with you and show you things.

Please don't be afraid of me.

* * *

I don't know whether to believe it.

Again I feel the eagerness and apprehension to put on the skull cap. Maybe that's just the feelings the book has. It wants me to try the helmet on.

I suppose I've come this far. I might as well satisfy the book's curiosity, if that's really what it's feeling. I suppose if the book wanted me to feel a certain way, or think certain things, then the book would probably be thinking and feeling the same.

I lift the cap up from the crafting bench, and stretch it over my head. The edges of the eye sockets of the helmet surround my own. The lower front tip of the cap covers my nose. My head feels hot from the thick leather, and slightly tingly from the residual crafting energy.

Then I fasten the jaw-shaped strap under my chin. The fit is snug.

I draw my sword out from its holster, and hold it flat to see my reflection. I almost look like an entirely different person. With both the cap and the chest plate combined together, I look all too much like a Skeleton. The helmet is just too much. I take it off.

I feel a sense of protest and disappointment, which must be from the book. I take the book out of my back pocket and open it up to the first page.

* * *

Why did you have to take it off?

It will give you much better protection than just your leather cap.

It looked great on you, too.

You have to let go of your stigma for the undead.

They are highly misunderstood creatures.

Look: if you promise to finish the armor and get Jonas's cousin to enchant it tomorrow, I promise I won't give you nightmares tonight.

* * *

Look, book: if I wear that armor, I'm going to look like a nightmare!

The words on the page fade, being replaced by new ones.

* * *

Just trust me, please.

You've already trusted me all this time.

You continued wearing the chest plate, and you crafted the skull cap out of your own free will.

And you discovered the crafting recipe in the process. Doesn't that make you feel proud?

Sure, the armor does have a shape that resembles a skeleton. But nobody in town was afraid of your new chest plate, were they?

If anything, you're afraid of me.


	8. Chapter 7: Lunch

I suppose the book does have a point. But there's only a certain level of trust I'm willing to give this book.

If the armor really is as good as the book insists it is, then it's worth crafting. Surely it won't hurt anything to craft the leggings and boots.

Except maybe Jonas's time. I feel bad letting him run the corral on his own for the rest of the day, but I want to make sure this book isn't trying to control me.

I begin arranging some bones and leather on the crafting bench again, when I hear a knock on the door. I come up to it and open it.

It's Ironbrawn, one of the night guards. I've never seen him not wearing his armor before, but he still looks like a giant. His shoulders are broad and every muscle in his body widens him by over a decimeter, much like the miners I see passing through town ever so often.

"Your Enderman friend wanted me to bring you lunch and ask you how you were doing."

"I'm fine, thank you." I take the cloth-covered basket he hands to me. "Tell Jonas, 'Thanks for the food.'"

"Who's Jonas?" Ironbrawn seems a little annoyed. He doesn't like Jonas too much and tries to avoid him, like most people in town.

"He's my Enderman friend you mentioned."

"Alright then." He sighs, and turns to leave. "Take care."

"You too." I close the door, and walk into the side room to eat the lunch Jonas gave me. He packed me some pork and melon, the usual lunch we eat in the afternoon, but also an Ender Pearl, for good luck. He always gives me an Ender Pearl when I'm at home and ill. I'm very lucky to have a friend like him.


	9. Chapter 8: Second Thoughts

After that satisfying meal, I return to the foyer to start crafting the leggings. I lay out the bones and leather together, trying to see if the pattern with the arrangement of bones between the layers continues.

Hours pass, as I try to arrange the bones in what feels like my intuition. I move my arm within the leather, when suddenly I feel the arrangement pull itself, and my arm with it, towards the center of the crafting bench. The seams form, putting pressure on my arm, pulling it in tighter. I struggle quickly to pull my arm out with great strength, and manage to tug it out, but rip the leather in the process. The rip is folded away as the bone-enforced leggings finish taking shape.

My arm feels numb for a moment as blood begins to pump through it again. That piece of armor put up a nasty fight! I will have to be more careful while crafting the boots. I guess crafting something new comes with its own danger: you never know when the crafting bench will start to pull on it.

Even so, I'm still frightened and amazed at what just happened. In all my years of crafting, I've successfully completed many crafting recipes I wasn't familiar with, even the skull cap just a half an hour ago, but I've never had to quickly move my hand out of the way like that. The crafting bench acts slowly, circumventing human touch, not rapidly and impatiently like it just did. I wonder if the book might be responsible?

I need to stop being so paranoid. I'm obviously not quite myself today. All the strange events that have happened have taken a toll on me. They are all happening because of this strange presence, the book, but it's not so much the book itself that is making me feel this way. I just don't quite understand how to react to everything that has happened.

I feel a sense of relief and satisfaction, as if some sort of understanding has taken place. It's definitely the book that feels that way, not me.

I lift up the leggings from the crafting bench, noting it's structure. The bones within the fabric are aligned parallel to its length, forming a solid plate near the kneecap. Again, the shape of the bones bears an uncanny resemblance to a Skeleton.

Another thought crosses my mind, that I must have felt for a split second before, but didn't quite develop: What's the point of all this? I know I'm crafting some supposedly good armor, but is it really worth it to do what the book wants me to do? What are the book's intentions? I don't care if the book says the armor is as strong as steel. It looks like a Skeleton. Perfectly suitable armor doesn't make you look like a monster when you wear it. The book doesn't get to dictate what I wear. I'm done with this stupid game.

I un-strap the bone chest plate from my back. The book projects a clear sense of surprise, frustration, and anger. I ignore it. I put my old leather helmet and chest plate back on, and lift up the bone armor from the table. I walk to the closet under the stairwell, open it, and toss the armor into the darkness. I hesitate for a moment, and then reach into my back pocket, take the book out, and throw it into the darkness as well. I shut the door.

"Why are you afraid of me?"

It's a voice inside my head. A female voice, deep and sad, pleading. I know it's the book, but I don't care anymore.

All I see is the wood of the door in front of me, and the wall under the stairwell. I feel a sense of relief, as if a huge burden has been lifted from my shoulders. I look outside the windows of the foyer, and the town is already covered in the darkness of the night. I realize how exhausted I am, from hunting skeletons early in the morning to searching for crafting recipes all day. I should go to sleep. I head upstairs, into my bedroom, and collapse onto the bed.


	10. Chapter 9: The Void

I'm in a library for some reason. The wooden ceiling is six meters up, and bookshelves reach all the way to the top. The bindings of each book are covered in a thin layer of dust, and the air is thick with the smell of old paper and wood shavings. The light is dim, barely comfortable to see in but dark enough for monsters to spawn. Even so, the room is absolutely silent. All I can hear is my own breath and heartbeat.

I walk down the hallway of bookshelves, until I reach a larger hallway, with seemingly endless lines of bookshelves facing it in both directions. I look down the left side of bookshelves, following the floor with my eyes upward and forward until it seems to shrink and then vanish, without meeting up with any observable wall. I look to the right and see the same thing, endless bookshelves with no end in sight. I decide to walk further forward a little longer.

I reach another large hallway. I look to the left again, and see a larger gap in between two lines of bookshelves, with wooden tables and chairs for reading. I walk towards it, and see a reed-bound book covered in dust, laid open with its pages facing down. I brush the dust off with my hand, and lift it to read. An old flint pen falls out of its pages and rattles against the table. They became obsolete when ink was discovered.

I turn the book over and hold it open to the first page. The flint script is faint, and the letters are written with the Latin alphabet, which I barely remember from when I was young and still in school. I struggle as best I can to read them:

"The purpose of this journal is to try to record what I have seen and done throughout my many years of deep research. I will do my best to summarize my findings and experiences, as well as search and provide explanations for the strange phenomena that fill our strange world.

"The primary focus of my research has been on crafting, as it is for many others. I think the significant amount of attention dedicated to the science of crafting is well-deserved. It is a very complex field, which draws both on the physical properties of materials as well as the metaphysical properties of the crafter.

"That second part of crafting, the metaphysical, is often fatally underestimated by most researchers. I hope that this journal can help prove that what we perceive and what we think is just as important to crafting as..."

This book is somewhat dull. I don't think I want to read any more of it.

I close the book and stand up from the table, and feel the body heat of someone leaning tightly against my back. I turn around and lock sight with two glowing purple eyes surrounded in Obsidian-colored blackness, with black runes surrounding them. A bony jaw lined with black knifed teeth drops down, unhatching unearthly groans and screams of agony.

I struggle against my fear to not look away from it, backing away slowly. Purple smoke begins to materialize between the Enderman and I. It thickens, and then shatters with the sound of dimensions being ripped apart and sewn back together again. Obsidian darkness takes its place, filling the room with Endermen, some so close they touch me as they wander past. Now many of them directly in my sight are screaming. I realize that the longer that I continue to stare, the more Endermen are going to stumble into my gaze and become driven into a frenzy.

I drop my eyes down the floor and turn around, running as quickly as I can, shoving countless Endermen aside, focusing only on the wooden floor and not stopping, hearing footsteps and enraged screams against my neck.

The wooden floor vanishes, leaving only the tainted blue of the void below. I feel myself stumble over air, falling and falling. The searing heat and silver smoke of the void envelopes me, igniting me with unimaginable invisible flames. I feel the void soaking into my mind, filling my consciousness with uncertainty and fear, chaos and destruction, and incinerating all my other perceptions with a pain more intense than any flame.

"Now do you see? Do you understand now the immense suffering I've been through and the pain I've felt, all these years? I try to forget my past. I try to share my knowledge with you, and you throw it away like trash! How selfish and gluttonous you are! Wake up, and face the truth!"


	11. Chapter 10: Mind Games

In a sort of lucid waking dream, I awake unconscious of my surroundings. The unburning heat of the void does not leave me; I feel hot and sweaty under thick fabric as if ailed by a sickly fever.

I struggle to stay awake, shaking as a sleep deprived body does in its second wind. I realize the struggle is also to keep my body on its two feet. Somehow I am standing, wearing armor, and my eyes are closed. I open them, and see in the dim light my hands resting on the crafting bench, holding a shifting mass of leather and bone, as it coalesces to form two boots.

How is this possible? Was I sleepwalking when I did this?

Somehow the fact that the skeleton armor is complete makes me wary of how these forces came to be, how I came to craft those strange things, one after the other. I'd rather I didn't try to discover how it happened, but somehow it doesn't feel right.

How could I have put on this armor in my sleep? Did my memories lapse somehow? Did the book somehow gain control of me through the nightmare?

The idea of the book's influence sinks in more. Somehow a precious part of my consciousness has been violated, and couldn't be rectified. The book is responsible for that violation. Part of me feels terrified, and another part enraged.

I thought I told you to leave me alone! I reach underneath the skeleton armor, for the back pocket underneath, and sure enough, there is the familiar square bulge. I reach within the pocket and grab the book out to open it, projecting my anger as I stare at the blank pages. Words materialize, both on the paper and within my mind.

"You did it! You should be so proud! Do you have any idea what this means?"

If you had any teeth, you'd be lying through them. Don't play coy. Explain what you did to me, and tell it to me straight.

"I'm not sure what you mean. I was simply a guide. The effort and credit belong to you."

You could start explaining what the nightmare you gave me has to do with me crafting these boots.

"I see no connection, and I'm not sure why you'd think I gave you a nightmare. I would never do that sort of thing!"

That's wrong. You're lying! You said it yourself that you gave me those nightmares. Then you made me craft this armor!

"I don't understand why you're taking your anger out on me. Besides, that armor is your accomplishment, not mine. I will take no credit. Perhaps there is some hidden grudge we need to discuss?"

I know what you're trying to do to me and I won't let you do it!

I have to get rid of the book somehow. Putting it in a closet isn't enough. I have to destroy it. I wonder how hard it would be to rip apart the binding... but it can still hear my thoughts!

"I wouldn't try that if I were you. I can make you feel whatever I feel, including pain. Perhaps you still remember the void, and what that felt like? That terrible, unbearable void..."

The book projects a deep fear and loathing. I remember how the pain felt, and for a small moment I feel sympathy for the book... but then I try to shut my mind off from the thought, knowing it is a trick meant to manipulate me.

"Don't be so upset. You've crafted the boots and made the decision to put them on. And for that, the nightmare is over."

But I never wanted to put them on. When did I make that decision? Never. The book is trying to tell me what to think. I won't let it.

But I don't have much of a choice. If I don't put on the boots, I will be thrust into another nightmare. Surely putting on a set of armor before bed to fulfill the book's false perception of control over me is better than the alternative.

I take the first boot, and stretch it underneath my right foot, sliding my leg into it. Then I take the second boot, and slide it over my left foot. Then I head groggily back to the bedroom, and slide clumsily into my bed.

But if I am coerced against choosing for myself, is that perception of control really false?


	12. Chapter 11: Leaving the Darkness

I hear a nervous knocking on the door, and realize that I must have slept in. I force myself to breathe in, opening my eyes, only to stare at the burning brightness of the high noon sun. I squint to protect my now sore corneas, glancing downward opposite my now raised arm, as I hastily shuffle my way off my bed and onto the creaky wood floor. I feel apprehension and fear that the sun will burn me under its vindictive gaze. Then I realize with relief that I am wearing the armor; it will protect me from the sight of the sun.

Is this another nightmare?

I gather the courage to lift my eyes to a level angle. Around me are familiar surroundings: the cobblestone etched in shadow from the bright skylight, the sun-bleached pine desk with the feather quill and ink propped up, with the Farmcrafter's Almanac resting closed beside it. To its right is a well-worn dust covered chest, and to its left the ever-present cobwebs which always seems to return no matter how many times they are swept away. Surely an environment which so closely resembles reality cannot be a nightmare, but at the same time a place that looked as accurately like my room as in reality existed within a nightmare. It is too soon to tell.

I remember with urgency that there is someone waiting at the door. Already fully dressed in armor, I do not bother searching for shoes. I grab my satchel from the floor, step with haste down the stairs into the foyer, and rush towards the door to open it. It is Jonas, breathing heavily. Underneath his cloak, he is wearing his iron chestplate where normally his farmer vest and burlap pants can barely be seen. He has a large leather bag strapped over his shoulder. His sword is strapped to his side.

"Fristad!" He exhales with relief. "Thank Notch you're alright! I was waiting for you by the corral all this morning; I had the hogs saddled up and everything..." He pulls the bag's strap over his head and lifts up the bag. "Do you need help packing?"

"Wait... where are we going? Why are we packing?"

"We're going to see my cousin, remember? He's just in the next town over."

"Oh yea, right." I take the bag from him. "So what do I need to pack?"

"Anything you want to bring that isn't food and water." Jonas explains. "The journey will take about a day and a half, so things like a change of clothes, an axe, and the like. You shouldn't need to pack much in terms of necessities, but I thought I'd bring a bigger bag just in case you needed more room for the... um..." He stares a bit sheepishly at me, scanning from my skeleton boots up to my skull cap. "...your armor. I figured my cousin could take a look at that as well."

I nod at him. "I agree. I'll start gathering my things. You wait just a minute; I won't be long."

I turn around and head upstairs to grab the almanac and another set of clothes from the dusty chest, and put them both inside the leather bag. Then I quickly unstrap and pull off the skeleton armor, and place that in the bag as well. I step into the shoes at the top of the stairs, and head back down into the foyer where Jonas is waiting by the door. I open the chest near him and take out the leather chestplate, sword, and axe inside. I quickly slip the axe into the bag's side pocket, strap the sword to my side, and pull on the leather chestplate. I nod at Jonas.

"Are you ready?" asks Jonas.

"Yea."

"Let me get that bag for you. I'll strap it onto your hog."

"Okay."

I hand the bag to Jonas. He takes it by the handle and carries it out to the hogs. I lean forward to step outside, but something feels terribly wrong. I feel hesitant. I lean my head away, backing slowly from the door.

I can't help but feel deathly afraid of the light. Even the idea of putting my finger out into it, just to test it, just to see what it feels like, only evokes expectations of terrible anguish and burning pain. Just seeing its indirect glow shining off of the gravel makes my legs stiff; it makes me want to sprint down into the darkest confines of the earth, or at least into the closet, the only place within safe reach where there is true darkness, true safety...

I look out towards Jonas, whose face seems to take on a different, unnerving appearance. Somehow his face seems to belong not to a friend, but to a heartless monster. I feel his presence as if it were tangible; it causes anger and hatred to flow into the pit of my stomach. There he is, that thief, packing away my precious armor onto the backs of his malicious steeds, purposefully making me feel vulnerable, insecure. I can't let him steal it from me! I have to take the armor back from this monster...

I shove this corrupted perception of Jonas out of my consciousness. Why do I even think these terrible things? I know what kind of person Jonas is.

"Hey um... Jonas?"

Jonas turns away from the hogs and my bag he just strapped to the one on the right. "What is it?"

"I'm sorry but... It's just that... What I mean to say is..." I struggle to block the anger I feel from Jonas out of my mind, trying hard to maintain a considerate tone. "I can't go on without the skeleton armor. I need it. It..." I struggle to find the right words to describe how much I need it... the total necessity the armor is for me... how awfully I need to have it back... while restraining insults and aggression aimed at Jonas that are a plague sickened by my need for it... "It... the armor makes me feel safe."

"Alright then," Jonas says. He turns around again and pulls my precious armor out of the leather bag, and brings it to me.

I grab it from him and run into the dark closet under the stairwell, closing the door. I quickly rip my old leather shirt off, so quickly that the sleeve tears, and I kick my old shoes off against the wall. Then I lift the skeleton armor up and place each piece on gingerly one by one, starting by sliding on the skull cap, then strapping on the chestpiece, then stepping into the leggings, and finally stepping carefully into the boots. Their protective touch reassures me. I feel a wave of relief wash over me. I remember what a good friend Jonas is. I feel like myself again.

I open the closet door and exit into the dim indoor light. As I walk through the foyer, and I walk into the light outside, I feel nothing. There is no uneasiness; it's as if I never experienced the fear of light before. I close the front door behind me, and approach the hog on the right. Despite the leather saddle and heavy bags hanging over it, it seems content. The pupil in the eye of the hog turns toward me, observing me with calm and innocence. I bend my knees, and jump to reach my leg over to the other side of the saddle. It grunts politely from the thump as I land on the saddle. In front of me, Jonas has climbed up onto his hog as well. He turns his head over his shoulder, so that his purple eyes can see me.

"Are you ready to leave?" asks Jonas.

"Yes, I'm ready."

And, with that, we lightly kick the sides of the hogs, guiding them down the town road, traveling downhill towards the forest, and into the depths of the shadow and trees, through a manmade gravel path that is narrow but well-traveled.


	13. Chapter 12: Reflection

It's been about an hour since Jonas and I first departed on hogback from the village. We haven't talked much, simply because there wasn't much to say. Jonas saw what happened to me when I took the armor off. He did not speak, both to sympathize with my troubles and to restrain judgment.

Back when I didn't know Jonas as well, I used to be frustrated by the fact that Jonas spoke so little when I felt like I needed his consolation the most. One time when I was sad, I asked him why he seemed to not want to talk to me. His response has always stayed with me:

"Sometimes rubbing a wound with words does not help it heal; it causes abrasion, which widens the wound."

Jonas is a selfless and reflective man. He knows a lot about feelings, but he rarely talks about his own. Often I wonder what Jonas' life was like before he moved to town, but even though we are close friends, I feel as if asking him is a violation of the trust between us. What I do know about him is what he has told me over the years about his family, and even then mostly simple things such as family relation and occupation, which most people will gladly share with strangers on the first day of acquaintance. On one of the few occasions I felt compelled enough to talk to him about it, I asked him who his mother was, and he didn't even seem to understand the question. I was willing to be patient and earn his trust, and over the years some of his quietness and solemnity has rubbed off on me.

In stark contrast is Airlass, a funny girl with sarcasm loaded into her cheeks, and snide remarks for any occasion. She grew up in the same home town as I did, and we haven't moved since. She always has had a love for the outdoors and a discipline with her axe that rivals a warrior's training with a sword. She kills creepers, something I could never muster up the courage to do, with such speed and finesse, and then jokes about it afterward as if they weren't a threat. She is always full of energy and loves to talk. She also tends to become emotional very easily. Sometimes I can't tell if she seriously feels a certain way or if she's faking her emotions for sport. Airlass is rarely serious, but she always knows how to cheer me up, and she isn't hesitant to offer help to those who need it. It is very possible that Jonas asked Airlass to help look after the farm for us.

Airlass knows me well enough that she understands who Jonas truly is. Other good friends of mine, such as the librarian Dunjen, or the nurse Azura, are good people, but they see Jonas the way everyone else sees him: a monster with no sympathy for humanity... a case of nature where it is only a matter of time... while his corrupted mind struggles to grasp human concepts such as emotion, sympathy, trust, and loyalty... before his patience cracks, and he feels the inevitable urge to kill. This perception, as flawed and lacking of evidence it is, is held firmly by most of the people of the village. It has cost him his spot in the lines of market tents. It has inflicted him cuts and bruises from being pushed over simply from standing too close. It has marked him as the blame for when the monsters of the night are more aggressive than usual. It has left him alone as villagers forbid him from entering public buildings like the town hall and the schoolhouse. It is no small wonder why Jonas is so reserved about his past, when his present is marred by distrust.

The silence of the ride has made me reflective. I think back on what has happened between me and the book since I last talked to Jonas about it: the second nightmare, the skeleton hunt, the crafting, the hesitance to accept the armor, the third nightmare, and the coerced finishing and emotional attachment to the armor. What seemed like a relatively easygoing day physically, was a grueling and painful day mentally. Now that the two of us are alone, I feel it is a good time to tell Jonas the rest of the story.

"Hey, Jonas?" I call to him.

"What is it?" Jonas responds.

"I... I feel like I need to tell you what happened after the last afternoon I helped you with the corral."

"I'm listening."

I sigh, preparing to speak. "Well, when first I got back home from the corral, the book was insistent I complete the armor.

Jonas nods as he continues to ride on the hog just in front of me, at the same pace as mine. There is an occasional faint rustling in the trees.

"Then when I went to bed that night, I had another nightmare. It started off like a typical summer day. It was hot in some field with cows. There were some small trees, and the grass was golden brown.

"Then it got really weird. I actually started burning alive from the heat of the sun. I had to run under the trees to try and make it stop. It scared the bajeezus out of me.

"Then I woke up early that morning to hunt skeletons, so I could get enough bones to finish the rest of the armor."

Jonas nodded again. "That makes sense. You needed materials to make the rest of the armor, so you took some leather from the corral, and you took some bones from the skellies."

"Hold on... what? You mean I took leather from the corral?"

"Yea, you asked if you could have some leather, and I said yes."

"I... never remember doing that. That's very strange. I remember everything that happened at that day at the corral. I must have just forgotten... but somehow I feel as if... I never planned to do it. Somehow I just went along crafting with the leather as if I always had it."

Jonas passively listens as we continue ride along in the seemingly endless forest. We all forget things, I suppose.

"Anyways, then I went back home to craft the helmet. After working for several hours, I finally finished it, and that's when you came by. You seemed very worried."

"Well, of course," Jonas replies. "Your absence was a warning sign."

"Right, I suppose so." I continue to think back on what happened. "After you left, Ironbrawn came back with the lunch you made me. That was quite tasty."

Jonas smiles briefly.

"Then I went back to crafting, I made the skeleton leggings. At that point, I decided I didn't really want to go through with what the book wanted me to do. It was trying really hard to get me to do it. It kept telling me I was afraid. I thought I could get rid of it by throwing it in the closet, but... then I had another nightmare.

"It started off in an abandoned library. I walked around for a while, and I found this old reed-bound book. I think it was some sort of crafting research book, but it was boring so I didn't really want to read it.

"When I put it down and turned around, I saw an Enderman leaning right up against me. I looked directly into its eyes, and it started to scream. I tried not to break eye contact as I broke away, but then all of a sudden there were Endermen everywhere. At that point I tried to run away, but the floor just... disappeared... and I fell into the void. Then the dream ended."

"Wait! Hold on..." Jonas suddenly seemed alert. There was a degree of urgency in his voice. He pulled back on the reins of his hog, and turned it around to face me. I pulled back my reins as well, so we were facing each other while stationary. "Did you feel anything when you were in the void? What did it feel like?"

I never expected that kind of question, especially from Jonas. But he seems worried, so I should probably tell him. "Just the thought of it..." My mind struggles for a moment. "...is painful to remember. I remember an unbearable heat, hotter than any flame. I felt as if I lost all sense of certainty of what it meant to exist. The void felt like it was it was seeping into my consciousness and tearing it apart."

"No one could possibly give such a detailed description of what it feels like to be that deep within the void..." Jonas pauses. His purple eyes seem focused into the distance. "...without having experiencing it firsthand. That's what confuses me. Most humans couldn't possibly survive in the void long enough to feel that. Most creatures would burn to death very quickly and then just respawn. The same goes for just about any inanimate object. Only an Ender-being could survive that deep in the void, but they wouldn't feel any pain. Half-bloods don't feel the pain either. That's how I know." His eyes focused back on me. "If your book really was in the void, it should have disintegrated almost immediately."

The answer was profound; it surprised me. "I had no idea Endermen could survive in the void."

"Yes," Jonas nodded, "that's how they teleport. Somehow the book understood the connection between Endermen and the void. I'm not exactly sure how, but I think it may help us understand how the book came to you in the first place. If you don't mind, I'd like to hear more of what happened."

"Alright, then."

Truthfully, I don't want to go on. I don't want to bring up the painful memories again, but if it can help Jonas' cousin understand the book better and help me get rid of it once and for all, then it's worth the pain.

"When I finally gained consciousness again, it was as if I was already awake. It was late at night, and I suddenly realized I was standing in front of the crafting bench, and I had already crafted the skeleton boots, the final piece of the skeleton armor. It was as if the book had briefly taken over my consciousness. I think the book's control over me seems to have grown since I started crafting the armor. Sometimes I worry that even what I'm thinking right now isn't coming from my true self..." I consider telling Jonas about how I suddenly perceived him when the book took hold of me, but I'm afraid he may not trust me any more if I do. "Then the book convinced me to put the full suit of armor on and wear it to bed. I woke up hearing your knock on the door, and after I opened it, you saw how I acted. Somehow I couldn't go outside without the armor. I felt deathly afraid that I'd burn to death in the sunlight."

Jonas nodded again. "I see how it is. For some reason, the book wants you to keep wearing that armor. It's how it exercises its control over you."

"Exactly. But what I don't quite understand is: why? I don't quite understand why that armor is so valuable to it."

"Perhaps the armor has some sort of magical properties we don't quite understand yet."

"Yea, that makes sense."

Then I remember back when the book wanted me to ask Jonas' cousin enchant the armor. I consider telling Jonas this, but I decide not to. If I did, Jonas would never let me do it. I feel curious to know what would happen to the armor if it was enchanted... and I was wearing it.

It looks like it's going to be a long, long ride.


	14. Chapter 13: Out of Town

The forest is no longer as thick as it used to be. The trees are somewhat shorter, allowing sunlight to shine through in large patches. The hogs rest blissfully in the grassy dust next to us, drowsy under the afternoon sun.

Jonas and I stand up, brushing the dirt off our pants. We just had our customary meal of pork and melon, and it's time once again to mount our hogs for a long ride.

I nudge my hog on its belly with my foot, and with a displeased snort the hog slowly lifts itself up from the ground. Once it has fully stood up, I climb onto its back and reach for its reins. Then Jonas and I steer our hogs towards the road, and continue on our journey.

After about an hour of riding, I notice a cobbled stone road on my left. It is the third side road I've seen since we started. It is a short road, leading to a rotting wooden gate. To the right of the gate is a sign reading, "Mighty Oaks City Gate. No Trespassing." On the other side is a shanty guard wearing torn leather armor and wielding a golden sword. He holds his sword at an ineffective angle, and nervously shifts his weight from one leg to the other as he avoids our gaze.

That guard wouldn't stand a chance against us. We could easily pillage the whole town, but that would be cruel. They are an unfortunate town, making do with what little resources and experience they have to protect and sustain themselves. It is likely that they have been pillaged many times, which in turn makes it more difficult to protect themselves from being pillaged again. Perhaps if their city wasn't nearly as close to the roads, them would fare slightly better.

As we continue to ride, and afternoon turns to dusk, Jonas and I approach a break in the forest, where the paved road ends. The terrain becomes steep and rocky, and riding the hogs becomes significantly slower as we carefully navigate the crisscrossing paths between gradually larger boulders. Eventually the terrain becomes so steep that it is no longer practical to ride, so we climb down our hogs and guide them by the reins as we slowly hike.

It is dusk now, and the blue of the sky is rapidly fading to a starry black, as the blush of the sunset fades from the west. We have reached the mouth of a cliffside cave, and the inside is lit with torches. As we enter, their eternal glow envelopes us in a relieving warmth which slowly leeches the cold from our skin. There are a series of paired stone brick pillars leading on the walls of a tunnel into its depth, and at the far end are two large iron-framed doors with a stone engraving above it. On the engraving, it reads...

"Welcome to the Adamant Mountain Inn. We hope you GO JUMP OFF A CLIFF!"

The second part is graffiti, written over the original second half of the engraving in black.

I want to ask Jonas what he thinks of this. "Hey Jonas, do you know why there's graffiti there?"

Jonas glances at it for a moment, not caring too much about what is written. "This place has long been abandoned. Most of what's left of it has since been stolen or vandalized, including the beds. It's not a very comfortable place to sleep, but it is one of the few refuges that will protect us from the monsters of the night."

"I see." I ponder the desolation of this place, wondering who has been here since then, and why someone would write such a hostile greeting on the wall. "Is it still safe, though? I mean... are the other people who come here, and are they dangerous?"

Jonas shook his head. "I've never seen anyone here." He pulled the reins of his hog forward into the tunnel of columns. "Come on, let's get inside."

It's not a very satisfying answer, but I figure it's nearly as mysterious to him as it is to me. I tug on the reins of my hog, so that we walk with Jonas and his hog down the corridor, up to the great metal-framed pine doors, which tower over us at perhaps three times our height.

Jonas does not seem discouraged by the size of the door. He hands the reins of his hog to me, and leans the door on the left with both of his arms. Slowly, the door gives way, moaning and crackling in a deep tone, as if its structure carries the wisdom of histories past. The musty smell of old wood, met with warm air, blows out toward us. The smell reminds me all too much of the abandoned library I saw in my dream.

We walk into a large room, our boots echoing on the stone. High on the ceiling is a wooden chandelier, and on the floor is a crisscrossing pattern of stone bricks, with a strange yellow glowing rock at each vertex. It may be the Glowstone which I have heard rumors of, but I have never seen it before so I wouldn't know for certain. There is no furniture to speak of. Off of each wall, there is a great hallway with an arched ceiling, each with many doors on either side of their walls, and every so often unintelligible writing made with various colors of paint. Down the center hallway, there appears to be another great room, with the same crisscrossing floor pattern as here.

Jonas hands his hog's reins to me again, and goes behind me to close the door. Its groans propagate loudly about the room, until finally ending in a deep, reverberating thud. The sounds of the wind and chirping insects, once hardly noticeable before, are suddenly gone, giving way to a profound silence.

Jonas takes the reins from me again.

"Follow me this way."

He leads us forward through the center hallway, our footsteps and breathing seemingly saturating it with noise. Then the light of the second great room surrounds us, again showing three hallways, one on either side and one in front.

Jonas turns to walk towards the hallway on the left, and we follow him into it. I notice what sounds like the echo of distant running water to my right. It gradually grows louder until, at the second door from the end of the hallway, Jonas turns to the right and opens the door. He points at it with his hand turned over, indicating that I should look inside.

I walk a little closer, and turning to the right I see a gaping hole spanning half of the wall and a quarter of the floor, with a torrent of water gushing through it diagonally like a waterfall from an earth tilted on its side. It's hard to imagine where such water would have come from, being so deep within the mountain.

"That's the loo." Jonas says casually.


	15. Chapter 14: Only the Present

For about an hour, we prepare for the night. Jonas helps me tie the reins of the hogs to the hinges of some doors near in the middle of the hall, and together we unload them so that they can sleep unburdened. After preparing for bed, we settle down with sleeping bags in the bedroom closest to the second large room.

After a long day of traveling, I feel tired, but it still feels too early to sleep. I turn my head to the right to face Jonas, with a curious thought.

"Jonas, I just realized something strange. Even though, like you say, this place is vandalized and all the furniture is gone, all the torches are still here."

Jonas meets my gaze. "I suppose then, that even though this shelter has been abandoned by its caretakers, it still retains the original purpose it is designed for."

Strangely, even in the solitude of the inn, Jonas remains fully concealed in his clothes. His leather gloves cover his hands... his cloak covers all else but his face and feet... and I even saw him wearing socks as he slid into his sleeping bag. His manner of dress is a testament to his habitual secrecy and vagueness, a relic of a foreign mind I will never fully understand. But somehow I feel that perhaps, in this solitude, he may open up a little, unfolding the hood of the robe of his personal life.

I feel inclined to ask him about this mysterious place, the abandoned, isolated shelter we now call home for the night. "How often have you been here, exactly? I mean... how did you find this place? It's so hidden."

Jonas sighs deeply, exasperated as usual from personal questions. "We're here now. That's all that matters." He turns over in his sleeping bag with his back facing me. "Let's get some sleep."

"Goodnight, then." I look down at my satchel laid down to my left. I feel disappointed, having wanted to talk to Jonas, but being dismissed. A little bored, I open up my satchel, and reach in it for my Farmcrafter's Almanac. I pull it out, feeling for the folded corner of the page I left off at, but I realize that the binding is much too thick for a magazine. I glance at it, and see a thick, blank leather cover. It is not the Farmcrafter's Almanac at all, but the Book.

I feel my stomach curl, and suddenly I realize I read that very Farmcrafter's Almanac before I fell asleep into the first nightmare. I remember feeling bored that night, but very tired. I remember reading the Almanac before I lost concentration and fell asleep. Is it possible that the Almanac was the Book all along?

But the Book said it was drifting in the void for millennia. Perhaps the Almanac was possessed, and became the Book? Was my fading consciousness a beacon for the Book to enter my mind? I open it.

"You are correct," the Book speaks. "I'm surprised you didn't figure that out sooner. I thought you'd remember better how we met. It's quite dismissive, really, to forget how you met a friend."

I'm not your friend. I never wanted to meet you. You came uninvited, and you've stayed long past my patience for you.

"So that's how you think of me, after all this time we've been together?"

Is it possible that I missed something? Have I selfishly dismissed an honest friend, ignoring their emotions and hopes? What if I told all those things to Jonas? I feel a sad longing, a pang of guilt. I know these aren't my thoughts. I try to regain my reason, and remember how I truly feel, but the sadness of it attracts me like a forgotten childhood memory. The feeling is so pointless... but I can't stop thinking about it. Why do I have these emotions?

"It's alright, Fristad. I understand. You can't figure out how you could have those emotions, because you feel out of place. First you skipped work to tirelessly create a new set of armor, and now all of a sudden you're traveling to a place you've never seen before. That's why you feel so uncomfortable in your own skin."

So you do understand. You know how difficult it's been.

I know there's been a conflict between us. It has hurt us both. I know that we had misunderstandings that seemed irreconcilable, but I'm glad we are at a consensus now.

But something still isn't right. I can't remember what is going on, or why I oppose these thoughts in the first place... I just know they're wrong!

"Why are you still so belligerent? What do you still have against me?"

I'm sorry. It's just that... I can't remember what it was exactly that bothered me. I can't think clearly about what I want to think anymore... but something about this is wrong! I know it's wrong... but I don't know how... or why. You did something to me... something important... you changed me somehow!

"I changed you?"

Yes. I'm not sure how, but you did, and there was some reason why I didn't want it to happen. Wait... never mind. It's not that I didn't want it to happen. I just couldn't figure out how I could have these emotions, because I feel out of place. That's why I feel so uncomfortable in my own skin. I understand now! I want you to change me!

"That's wonderful. I never thought our relationship was this close. Perhaps I haven't had enough faith in you. In fact, I'm flattered. Have I really changed you so much already? Perhaps I should change you even more."

Yes.

I close the Book, and slide it into my pocket. Then I slide as deep into my sleeping bag as I can, and close my eyes. I feel as if I am falling through darkness, as the Book plunges me into the deepest of my subconsciousness.


	16. Chapter 15: Duality

It is very dark and unbearably cold. I am standing upright with my arms stretched forward, grasping vertical, icy cold steel bars. The metal is barely visible as a faint grey sheen. Beyond the bars is absolutely nothing. It is a fog of perfect blackness.

I tilt my head down towards the floor. My feet seem to float in space, even though I feel a solid floor. The floor looks as black as the nothingness beyond... perhaps it is too difficult to see. I tilt my head up to try and spot the ceiling, but it is also much too dark to see.

I feel a strange longing. Even though there is only darkness, I feel as if the darkness holds the potential of a pristine, pastoral wilderness. Anything is better than the confines of these iron bars.

I try to let go of the iron bars, but nothing happens. I feel the strain of my muscles maintaining my grip on the bars, but I can't control them. I try to lift my legs, but they feel as stiff and unbendable as stone. The more I try to move some part of my body other than my neck, its muscles become saturated with restlessness, unable to move and yet extremely uncomfortable because of that. The futile dark nothingness seems ever more tantalizing. Why must I be tormented this way?

"Because..."

It the female voice of the Book... except it is different. Before when I heard this voice, it was the projection of a voice within my thoughts. This time, it is a voice clear and loud. I feel it as sound through my ears, reverberating down my spine and through my hands to the fingertips with every consonant.

"...I am trapped. You are trapped. The iron bars you see in front of you, trapping you in a black empty space, are trapping me as well. Our minds are trapped in a prison, and you know the means by which we can escape. You know our captor... and you have the power to take from him the freedom that is rightfully ours."

Freedom... what a distant concept it seems right now. It simply isn't plausible. Nothing visibly exists except these iron bars. I can't move anything except my head. For all we know, I could remain in this very spot for years... perhaps millennia.

"I have drifted in the void for millennia. The time will come. You must try."

I want to... but I can't. Besides, why would it matter? Is endless darkness really any better than the certainty of confinement?

"We can't afford to think like that. Complacency is poison. It is creating the mental weakness within you that has prevented you from escaping all this time."

I know... you're right. I have to figure out a way to get out of here... somehow...

I fixate on the darkness, desiring to enter its hidden green fields. I imagine the sweet success of tearing the bars apart with a pickaxe and stepping through. Nothing happens. It is just as before: I am unable to move my arms or walk. There is only the iron bars in front of the darkness, with my hands permanently grasping them.

There's nothing that I could possibly do. I'm stuck here.

"No you're not. You are deceiving yourself. There is a reason why you are trapped here, and if you find out why, you can escape. The answer lies in our captor; he is why we are confined by these iron bars, and he is how we will go free."

But I don't know where he is! How am I supposed to find him?

"You already know the answer to that question."

I look into the darkness. It is as monotonous and black as it was before. Where is my captive? Who is he? Is he someone I know? Is he Dunjen? Is he Jonas? Is he me?

A dim figure materializes on the other side of the iron bars, standing at a certain distance and holding the bars in a certain way as to appear to be an exact reflection of me, but instead wearing the regular leather hat and shirt I wore before I met the Book. The moment I look into his solemn eyes, his identity becomes clear. He is my identity, my captor, holding me as a prisoner in these iron bars, preventing me from truly existing. He is the conspirator who all this time has been seeding animosity between me and the Book, preventing our inevitable fate and lasting friendship from being fulfilled.

I must imprison him. He must be on the other side of the bars, feeling what I feel. I will it possible. I look into his ignorant eyes, seeing his pathetic distress as he realizes that I am him, and he is me, that he is the one trapped, and that I am his captor, purifying my own existence by ridding myself of his contaminating thoughts. Pride and a sense of true purpose fills my chest. I smile at him, taunting him as I lift my hands from the bars. I look to my left and my right, and see that the iron bars do not surround be, but instead end at sharp corners bending away from me, forming the rectangular shape of the generously large 2-by-2 meter cage that imprisons my corrupted self. Satisfied with the conditions of his imprisonment, I turn around and walk into the darkness. At the will of my foot, grass forms where I step, spreading forward into the horizon and germinating a sunlit sky that grows taller and surrounds the visible sphere of landscape. I turn around to see the rapidly shrinking blackness, with no sign of the false Fristad in view. He has been made as black and shapeless as nothingness so he may never be seen as human, and blind as to never see again, just as I have willed it.

I take a deep breath, and tilt my head up toward the sky with a triumphant laugh. It is good to be the master of my own dreams.

It is also good, after much time waiting, to truly communicate with the Book. I realize now the terrible things the false Fristad has done to us. Now that he is gone, we can see together what wondrous possibilities lie ahead. It was a long process... brought forth first on the very day I first spawned, when I said, "Book, come to me! I seek to share my existence with you, savor your consciousness within me, and adopt your aspirations to fulfill our life!" I had made the decision the moment my life began, and all my life I had been searching for what I have found just now. I am setting foot on a path to incredible power. Today, I have conquered my dreams. Tomorrow, I will conquer pain, and in the many days that come after tomorrow, who can fathom what I will achieve?


	17. Chapter 16: Zomem

I wake up, the first thing I notice when I open my eyes being a tall grey stone ceiling. I look to the right, noticing that Jonas and his sleeping bag are both gone, as well as all the other bags we set down. Somewhat confused, I sit up, looking at the wooden door, which is now cracked open, but not enough to notice anything except the stone wall on the other side of the hallway. I stand up, then bend down to roll up my sleeping bag and hang my satchel around my shoulder. Then I head out into the hallway. Turning right, I see Jonas with the hogs all strapped up with our cargo. He is sitting with his back against the belly of one of the hogs, eating a loaf of bread.

"Good morning," Jonas says. "Here, have some bread."

He opens up the bag closest to him, pulls out a loaf of bread, and tosses it to me. Then he reaches into the bag again, and pulls out a full canteen, setting it down next to him.

I sit down on his right, biting into the loaf. It is fresh and soft, and the mere imagining of its taste makes my mouth water. We take turns sipping the canteen, and after that silent meal, we stand up simultaneously, unfasten our hogs from the doorknob, and lead them out of the abandoned inn through the giant iron-framed doors. From the mouth of the cave looking out, the sky is a beautiful cold morning blue, asymmetrical in hue from the light of the sun.

We head out to the cave's very edge, where a rocky cliff face looks far down onto the sparse end of shrubs which leads to the beginning of a cobblestone path and later a forest, out a significant distance, and continuing as a bumpy plane of green out into the horizon. Then, we turn a right, carefully guiding our hogs on a narrow edge, climbing up many rocks to eventually ascend to the dirt which is held up by the ceiling of the cave we were just in. Onwards the path is still rocky, but not quite as steep.

The terrain is much too rocky for the hogs, so we continue to travel on foot with them alongside us. The journey through the rocky outcrops is strenuous and tiring. After three hours of traveling, we stop on top of a small mesa to rest.

Then, after an apple and a half hour's rest, we continue our trek through the many rocks. After a little past noon, we finally notice patches of dirt and weeds among gradually decreasing numbers of rocks. The slope starts to descend, and we get our first glimpses of the bottom: trees with much space between them, with brown grass. Far off to the left and near the horizon, the roofs of unidentifiable buildings can be seen poking up behind the trees.

The slope quickly becomes steep, and we must veer to the left to follow a narrow path down the dusty mountain. Once the path ends at a much lighter slope, we climb onto our hogs and ride down the mountain and through the dry forest. After about an hour of smooth riding, we arrive at the beginnings of a gravel path, which leads us into the outskirts of a medium-sized town.

The character of the place, from the first time I see it, is odd. The architecture is different what I am used to seeing. Building walls with cobblestone are the norm, rather than stone bricks. The path is lit with torches on top of smoothstone, rather than on top of wooden posts.

Suddenly a figure appears from behind the corner of a cobblestone building in front of us. I accidentally make eye contact with it, which it immediately notices and turns to stare right back at me. It looks more or less humanoid in stature, and wears human clothes, but its hands and face hint at a much different identity. Its hands are covered in a grotesque combination of green, dead, and moldy leaves as well as fur, and the fingers end in thick black claws. The face is covered in a similar manner to the hands, with big, black, beady eyes, large nostrils, and a toothless mouth with a large underbite. What terrifying eyes! Such a perverted scowl! Oh Notch I hate Creepers...

The Creeper takes in a deep breath. "Ssstrangersss," it moans, its voice cracked and dry.

The thing walks toward us slowly, a tactic meant to deceive us into a false sense of security. I have to get ready to attack. It could charge at us and detonate at any moment. I reach for the sword at my belt... but Jonas obstructs my reach by putting his hand underneath mine. I turn to look at him in urgent frustration.

"Jonas, what are you doing? I need to get my sword!"

"He's just a half-blood. He won't hurt us." His purple eyes look into mine, and I remember that he's a half-blood too.

But it's a Creeper! Oh Notch, I can't stand them...

But I have to trust Jonas. Certainly he would know, being an Ender-born. I reluctantly relax my arm to let it rest at my side. The Creeper is only three meters from us now! I clench my jaw, trying to stay calm and keep a polite gaze in its direction. It stops just under two meters from us.

"Welcome to Zzzomem..." It hisses, "My name isss Frank... What are your namesss?"

It turns to face me, looking at me with its beady eyes. I am too nervous to say anything. I briefly shift my gaze towards Jonas, to try and get the pressure of his gaze off of me.

"My name is Jonas," he says, "And this is my good friend, Fristad. Pleased to meet your acquaintance."

"Indeed," the Creeper Frank moans, his eyes gleaming in surprise, "Ssso you're a half-Enderman then? I never know they exxxisssted... You have a very ssstrange accccccent. Your Consssonantsss are very loud... almossst like a popping sssound... and you sssay vowelsss differently..."

It's kind of hard to tell what Frank is saying with his terrible lisp and slow, monotone voice... but it makes me think about how much I must have had to adjust to the way Jonas speaks. I suppose it's been a while since I've talked with Jonas for the first time... perhaps I've listened to him talk long enough that I've grown used to it.

"That's interesting. I never realized that," Jonas says, mulling it over, "Well, Fristad and I have to meet up with my cousin. I'll see you later, I suppose."

"Take care," Frank says. He turns around and walks up the path towards the way he came, passing out of sight behind the same building.

Jonas glances at me quickly, revealing a subtle smirk. "He must be new here."

We walk up the gravel path a score or so meters, entering onto a smoothstone road which seems to be the beginning of some sort of town square. There are small fountains on either side of us, and buildings with a mix of cobble and wood surround the square. Their wide windows and ostentatiously placed signs suggest they are shops of some kind. Jonas leads the hogs and I to the left. We walk for a while past cottages, farms, and small pastures. Some of the fencing appears to be broken and there is bare dirt in some places where crops and animals should be. We have to navigate the cobble road carefully around deep ditches.

Three kids with muddy clothes chase after a piglet as it runs across the road in front of us, squealing and calling after it. The air smells like sewage. Someone is yelling off some distance to the left. We pass by a cobblestone cottage with the door hanging open crooked, barely held up by the top hinge. Up ahead, the broken road is surrounded on each side by brown grass, small buildings, and the occasional tree stump.

We walk past several cottages in varying states of disrepair, until Jonas directs me to turn left onto a thin gravel path. We walk up to an unadorned cobblestone house, smaller than any of the other ones we've seen so far, with no windows. Jonas walks up to the door and knocks on it. We wait for what seems like several minutes, but nothing happens.

"Hmm, no answer," Jonas remarks, "I suppose we might as well go inside."

He grasps the knob of the door and pulls it outward. He then leads the way through it, guiding his hog by the reins to follow him inside.

I guide my hog towards the door. As we walk inside, I see the shadowed walls lit by a lone torch on a table in the center. On the far wall is a staircase leading downward. After pulling my hog inside, I close the door behind me.

"Oh, good," Jonas says, "The stairwell is open. My cousin should be back soon." He turns to face me. "It's risky here to leave our hogs outside unsupervised, even in the daytime. Someone would try to steal them... and we wouldn't want to draw attention to ourselves. So for now, at least, we'll be leaving them in the foyer."

He ties the reins of his hog together and puts them on top of the harness. Then he starts to remove the bags hanging over it and placing them down on the ground. I start to do the same. I feel the warm sweat accumulated on my back, trapped by the thickness of my skeleton armor. Should I take it off? I feel reluctant to do so. I want to feel cooler in this arid shack, but at the same time I'd rather endure the heat than to risk taking it off.

The book almost has me, doesn't it? I can't comprehend exactly how.

I finish taking off the last sack from the hog. Jonas begins to walk down the stairway with some of the bags. I pick up some of mine and follow him down. The stairwell is barely wide enough to walk down. Its smoothstone walls slide against our bags as we pass. We walk down a sharp bend left in the stairwell, which leads us into a room much larger than the one we were in before.

Shelves reaching near the ceiling are filled with books of tome-like proportions. They are reed-bound and leather-bound, etched and inked, some adorned with metal corners and embroidery, others much simpler. Many are written in Standard script, but there are also many lettered in Latin, and many others besides those in languages entirely foreign to me. Some higher shelves have metal flasks of various sizes. On the right wall, there are shorter shelves with strange artifacts, as well as various chests. One of them is an odd, darker color, emitting dark purple smoke.

Jonas leads me to the left again, taking me down another level of stairs. We come into a narrow hallway with three doors, two on our left and one on our right. Jonas takes me down to the second door on the left. He opens it for me, and leads me inside. It is a bedroom with a wide bed to the right and a full wall shelf with various books to the left. At the back is a small wooden table, and in the center of the floor is a single glowstone block, illuminating the subterranean room with an incoherent golden glow.

We place our bags up against the bed, and then head upstairs to get the rest of them.

So this is it. This is where Jonas' brother will cure me from the troubling influence of the Book: this underground cellar, in an isolated town in a state of disrepair, surrounded by strangers...


	18. Chapter 17: The Ender Chest

I'm sitting on the dry brown grass as I look beyond the tiny cobblestone cellar house. There is a wide stretch of plains with scattered buildings, and sparse forest beyond the town, eventually cut off by the ascent of the barren mountains. I see one hog slowly and reluctantly grazing in front of me, while the other drinks from a metal trough off to the side of the house, and Jonas watches them while sitting against the house. It's well into the afternoon, and the sun will soon reach the horizon in the west.

Suddenly I hear barking and growling coming from behind me. It continues incessantly and each bark is louder than the one before it. Out of curiosity, I stand up and turn towards the road. There's a grey husky running directly toward us from the road, and further down the road is a tall, pale man in a full-body cloak, carrying a basket covered with cloth.

The husky has just run off the road and is still barking at us. Its tail is dramatically wagging from side to side, propelled by the thrust of its breakneck sprint. It's running right towards me. It propels itself into the air with its paws stretched forward. I feel them knock into my gut and the wind rush out of my lungs from the energy of the stab. I lose my balance and fall backward as the weight of the husky crashes its fur into my chest. The husky's face stares at mine, leaning its wet nose closer to me as I fall. My back painfully thuds on the dry grass as its tongue and teeth slam into my nose. It stands up on uncomfortable places on my chest and groin, covering my face with its slobber and stinky breath as I struggle to lean my face away with my eyes closed.

"Sunshine, no! Get off of him!" Says an unfamiliar, deep voice, annoyed and out of breath.

After a painful push of its hind legs and a scratch of its claws, the husky jumps off of me. I wipe the sticky saliva off my face with my arm as I sit up. The husky is trotting joyfully alongside the legs of the tall cloaked man, launching restrained leaps towards the lip of the basket as the man struggles to walk around it.

"Honestly, I don't understand how I live with her! Jonas, is that you?"

"Yea I am," Jonas says behind me.

"What's that strange man doing here? My brave princess ran right towards him!"

"He's a good friend of mine who needs your help," says Jonas.

"Is that so?" Jonas' cloaked cousin's tone changes, becoming much gentler and slower, almost reflective. He stops walking and glances with his unnervingly vibrant blue eyes over his shoulder back towards me, just as I finish standing up and begin brushing the twigs off my back. "Of all people you could have asked, why me?"

"It's has to do with a sentient entity of sorts. It is probably wise that we discuss the matter indoors."

"Then it will be so! Say, what's your name, stranger?"

"Umm... Fristad," I mutter, still a little surprised after being knocked over by that dog, "What about you?"

"My name is Vrendan Wildheart Ti'Drannes. But please do call me Dan!" Dan grins pleasantly with his eyes directly on my own. "I thought I knew you were a good friend when Sunshine ran towards you. She has a sense for those things. She's smarter than most people give her credit."

Sunshine barks eagerly, sitting close to Dan between him and the cellar house.

"See? She's pretty frustrated about that!" Dan sidesteps around her again, walking towards the house. "Come on, Fristad. Let's go inside and discuss what's troubling you."

I walk with him up to the house, and reach for the reins of one of the hogs.

"Don't worry about your steeds. Sunshine will guard the fields and make sure they're safe. Isn't that right, girl?" Dan reaches into the basket and pulls out a porkchop. Sunshine becomes entranced by the porkchop, staring at it while staying very still. Dan bends down to hand it to her, and she swiftly and zealously chomps her jaw around it, carrying it as she trots several meters away, then laying down in the dry grass to chew on it, holding it between her forepaws.

"It is a pleasure to have you as a guest," says Dan.

He walks to the door and opens it, entering inside the cobblestone structure. I follow him through the doorway, and Jonas closes the door behind us as Dan begins to step onto the stairs. We follow him down the narrow stairway to the library floor below. Dan walks towards the wall on the right with the chests and artifacts, and stops in front of the strange dark chest with glowing purple smoke. He bends down to open it, and places the basket, covered in cloth, inside of it. As the basket nears the lip of the chest, the basket as well as his arms begin to turn translucent, enveloped by thickening purple smoke that seems to slither and dance around his arms. The smoke traces along the length of his arm with playful vigor, as if it were alive. Dan leans down a little further. The basket and the fingers holding them disappear entirely, then Dan stands up, his arms no longer carrying the basket, and remaining translucent for many seconds until the slithering purple smoke gradually recedes back into the open chest. He then grasps the lid of the chest with one hand and swiftly closes it. The chest seems so odd and alien... I wonder what causes it to have such an unusual aura.

"What's up with that chest?" I ask.

"What chest?" Dan inquires nonchalantly. "Do you mean this one I just opened? This is just an Ender chest."

"I've never heard of that before. What does it do?"

"Oh, it's just like an ordinary chest, really. At least, it behaves exactly like an ordinary chest... under most conditions. It's very useful for long-term storage... it's great for keeping food from spoiling and private belongings out of reach of prying eyes." Dan chuckled as he gave me a contemplative stare.

"Sounds really useful... but why the purple smoke?"

"The purple smoke is due to void energy leaking out. That's also why it's made out of Obsidian." Dan kicks the chest gently with his foot, which resulted in a low, muffled thump. "Only a material as hard as Obsidian could withstand the all-consuming caustic atmosphere of the void."

For a brief moment, the memory of the void burning away my consciousness creates a cold dread within my stomach... but the strange nature of the chest then becomes ever the more fascinating with the thought of the terrible evil it keeps at bay.

"Why isn't the void energy burning up all the items, then?"

"That's where the Ender-magic comes in. It negates the void's destructive nature, creating purple smoke as a result."

"That certainly doesn't sound like as ordinary a chest as you claim it to be."

"It certainly wouldn't seem to be, would it? But really, in practice, its use is the same. Here, I'll show you!"

Dan walks behind us, between the bookcases. I hear the sound of small wooden drawers being open and shut. Dan walks back holding a dried daisy in his hand. He hands it to me.

"Try opening up the chest and putting this inside."

I walk up to the chest while holding the flower. I open it, and my eyes begin to feel a little fuzzy. Everything seems to have a purple tint. The inside of the chest is dark like the outside, and aside from the purple smoke, the square shape on the inside seems normal. I bend my knees a little to reach my hand with the flower down into the chest. My hand and the daisy don't seem to become translucent, but I feel a strange tingling warmth on my arm as the purple smoke dances about it. I drop the daisy into the chest... and then I realize that there should be Dan's basket in there. Where did it go?

"Wait, hold on a minute," I say. "Why isn't your basket in here?"

"A very good question! That is one of the few unusual anomalies of the Ender chest... its contents are unique to the person using it. Anything you put in there can only be retrieved by you, and no one else..." Dan's voice trails off wearily. He pauses for a moment, seemingly deep in thought. "...which reminds me of something I probably should have told you earlier... You must be very careful when you open that chest. Don't bend too far over it, don't lean your weight on it, and close it quickly when you're done using it."

His sense of fearful caution is a sudden change. "What do you mean? Is it dangerous?"

"Not at all... as long as you use it correctly..." Dan seems to hesitate for a moment. "There have been many reports of young children who have wandered into an Ender chest and become trapped inside. Some have even fallen accidentally into an Ender chest because it was carelessly left open. They become trapped inside their own dimension, inaccessible by the outside world. They will never be able to get out."

"Yea, but... I could never fit in there. A very small child could fit in there, maybe... but I probably could hardly fit any more than my head in."

"I wouldn't think so either... but it's better to stay safe. What I'm trying to say is... be careful. It's nothing to be afraid of and I encourage you to use it... but just be mindful."

"Alright, then."

I open up the chest again, take the flower out of it, close the chest, and give the flower back to Dan.

"Thank you." Dan goes back quickly behind the bookshelves to put the flower away in a wooden drawer.


	19. Chapter 18: Dan's Inquiry

What would it be like, for those little children, stuck inside of the Ender chest, all alone? Surely they would be lonely... but not being able to get out, for who knows how long, how awful that would be! They would most certainly starve... but what before that? Would they feel the burning of the void in there? No, probably not because of the Ender magic. Still, it is a terrible way to end...

Dan returned without the flower. It is strange that he wears a cloak, just like Jonas. Except his cloak is a smooth grey, and Jonas' is brown and stained from heavy labor on the farm. They seem they would be fitting cousins if it weren't for the fact that one is human, and the other an Ender-born.

"Now then," Dan begins, "Why don't we discuss what is troubling you? Follow me."

Dan leads us through the bookshelves, up to the left wall on the side farthest from the staircase. There is a wall with a landscape painting and no shelves beneath it, and a bookshelf to the left.

"Wait here," he says.

He walks over a little to the left, and reaches with his arm between some of the books. A shift of his arm makes a clicking sound. Then he walks over a little more to the left and reaches further down, making the same clicking sound. He walks over just a little more, and a third click prompts a grinding and shifting which causes the stone beneath the painting to withdraw back into the wall. A staircase is revealed, leading down into a tunnel with a faint yellow glow emanating near the bottom, where it seems to flatten into a hallway. Dan walks into it and steps down.

"Come on in. I'm sorry it's so narrow."

Jonas and I walk down the staircase, mindful of our heads on the shallow ceiling perhaps only a few centimeters away. A pocket of cool, damp air envelopes us. As we descend below the lower level ceiling, the entrance to a large room comes into view. There is a wide table with vials and bones placed upon it, next to an open book and a quill in its ink stand. A chair facing the book is slid out from the table. A glowing grate on the ceiling emits yellow light. As we near the edge of this room, three hallways can be seen, one on each wall, with bookshelves between them.

Dan leads us through the hallway on the right. It leads to what seems to be a kitchen, with the left wall occupied by wooden cabinets, a counter, a furnace, and a sink. On the far wall is a large table with ornate chairs. In the center of the table are a bouquet of flowers, seemingly thriving despite the lack of light underground, and behind them is a shelf indented into the wall, stocked with drinks of various sorts and stacked glasses. The kitchen seems so out of place amidst the rooms of occult bookshelves and obscure passageways, and yet it is comfortingly inviting.

"Your kitchen is very nice," I say.

"I appreciate that. It would be quite a shame if it wasn't." Dan slides out each of the three chairs from the table, then walks over to sit in the one on the left. "Please have a seat."

I walk over to the chair on the right and sit in it. Jonas takes a seat in the chair in the middle.

"Would either of you care for some thin? Or perhaps some water?"

"I'm fine, thank you," I reply.

"No, thanks," says Jonas.

"Alright then." Dan lifts his hands to pinch the hood of his cloak. He lifts it and pushes it back, revealing short, wiry, silver hair. Then he reaches one arm inside of his cloak and pinches the outer flap of his cloak, opening it and pulling the sides back over his shoulders and onto the chair. He pulls his arms through, revealing the long, white sleeves of his shirt. It has a formal collar around the neckline and sleeves, and dark grey buttons. The very act of Dan taking off his cloak surprises me, as I've never seen Jonas so openly reveal himself. What once was the secretive cloak of a mysterious magician becomes the collared shirt of a lively gentleman. His blue eyes seem to reflect confidence rather than contemplation. He clasps his hands together on the table. "So, Fristad, please tell me, as best you can, the nature of your troubles."

The inquiry represents a pivotal shift of events. My relationship with the Book will be altered by this encounter, based on the perceptions that Dan develops as a result of my explanation of the events between me and the Book up to this point. I must be cautious of what I say, or Dan may assume my experiences warrant the permanent destruction of the Book. I certainly want to maintain sovereign control over my own thoughts, but destroying the Book is simply too risky. Our mental connection has deepened to the point that complete reversal is no longer possible. In addition, I must ensure that Dan puts enough trust in my capacity for free will that he does not become suspicious when I ask for my armor to be enchanted. The best course to take is frank but unrevealing.

I reach into my back pocket, and place the Book upon the table. "It is this book. It communicates with me through its pages, my thoughts and my dreams."

Dan's eyebrows lifted. "Ah, that is a trouble far stranger than I anticipated." He picks up the Book and opens it to the first page. He scratches his head, his eyes jumping from side to side as he reads it carefully. He squints for a moment, unnerved as he loses focus of the line he was reading on. "The contents of it seem to change. Very odd indeed!" He looked up at me. "Where did you acquire this strange book?"

"I didn't really intend to obtain it. I began reading it while in a dream, and somehow, when I woke up, it was in my back pocket."

"What sort of dream?"

"It was some sort of nightmare. I was surrounded by monsters, and somehow I was reading it and they just stood there, watching me."

"So, it didn't come to you in a physical form, initially?"

"No," I reply.

"Hm. That hints at a spirit of some sort." Dan looked down at the page again. "What are you, and what is your name?"

The female voice of the Book responds. "I do not have a name of any kind, nor do I require one. I am a book, an inanimate object, inviolate, unchanging, and finite."

Dan does not seem to be surprised by the female voice. He seems to still be reading over the page with his eyes, as if he never heard the voice. Perhaps it is only inside of my head. Dan speaks again, "Where do you come from?"

"I come from the void. In the first several thousand years of my existence, I have been trapped inside of it, in unimaginable pain and anguish."

"That sounds terrible," Dan says. He lifts his head. "The book seems, surprisingly, to identify itself as an inanimate object, and yet it recalls terrible pain from being trapped in the void for thousands of years. Were you aware of this?"

Jonas and I nod our heads.

Dan looks down at the page again. "Why are you here?"

"As for existing in the first place, I came into being of my own volition. After having burned in the void for innumerable years, I saw Fristad's consciousness as a means to escape it. His consciousness served as an anchor, allowing me to achieve physical form. In return for my dependence on him for my physical existence, I pledged to him my wealth of knowledge, which I impart to him as he sleeps."

Dan looks up. "It says that it is responsible for its existence, and used your consciousness as a means to escape the void and manifest itself in physical form. It also says that it brings you knowledge as you sleep. Would you say this is what you have experienced, Fristad?"

I nod my head. It is not an exact description, but it is close enough in a broader sense.

Jonas shakes his head in disbelief. "That is not at all what Fristad told me. He said the book was giving him terrible nightmares. He said that the book was trying to control his thoughts, and that it was trying to convince him to craft the skeleton armor, which he is now wearing as you see him before you."

I look into his purple eyes, trying to reassure him. "The book certainly exerts more influence over me than I would like, which is a problem. However, I was hasty to portray the dreams that the Book gave me as simply nightmares. They were much more than that."

A slight sadness comes into Jonas' brows. "Fristad, the book is trying to control you. It is changing the way you perceive the world. I can see it in the way you look at me."

I look deep into Jonas' purple eyes, seeing them surrounded in his black face covered in runes, framed in the brown hood of his cloak. I can no longer deny the instinctive sense of repugnance I feel. An irreconcilable part of me sees him as a monster. I feel a heartfelt jealousy for his immunity to the void's malicious flame. The very thought of despising him goes against my deepest, long-held beliefs, but I feel as if it will inevitably persuade me, and the protest of my past self become meaningless. Jonas is right. The book is changing my beliefs. But how can it be stopped, without destroying what has become a part of who I am?

"I am inclined to believe Jonas." Dan closes the Book. "Fristad, you know you wouldn't be here unless you felt that something was very wrong."


	20. Chapter 19: The WOC

Dan hands the Book back to me. I put it away in my pocket.

"What do you propose we do about it?" I ask hesitantly. I fear of what may happen next, now that Dan is convinced that the Book is a danger to my existence.

"Nothing for now," Dan says. "It is late. We will let the matter rest so that you may both get a good night's sleep to recover from your difficult journey. I will, of course, take various precautions, but I think for your own safety, they are best left unsaid."

Dan puts his cloak back on, and stands up. Jonas and I stand up as well. We walk up the hidden stairway, beneath the painting, which Dan closes behind us before walking away. We then walk down the other staircase to the bedrooms. Jonas opens the door, and I walk into the room's incoherent yellow glow. Our bags are against the bookcase, and the bed on the right sits invitingly. I suddenly feel a wave of tiredness sweep over my body.

"Geez," I groan. "If I were any more tired, I'd sleep on the floor."

"I can get a sleeping bag for you if you want."

"No, thanks."

I walk over to the far side of the bed and fold the sheets back. I climb underneath the covers and pull them up over me. I close my eyes, thinking of nothing as I wait for sleep to come over me. Then I realize, with a pang of fear, that my consciousness will slip into the control of the Book, privy to whatever dream or thought that the Book wants me to think.

* * *

I sense that my consciousness has shifted, as if it was pulled out into the ether. I breathe in the oddly familiar smell of old paper and wood shavings, and open my eyes. Once again, I see the dim and endless bookshelves of the library. Why am I here again?

I search for the sound of voice, but there is no reply. Does the Book know I'm here?

I walk forward through the aisle of bookshelves, just as I did before. My footsteps, heartbeats, and slow breaths are the only sound. Just like before, the bookshelves seem to stretch on forever, their distance causing them to become engulfed in the dusty fog.

I walk up to an intersection of the parallel bookshelves with a hallway. Looking to the left, I see the lines of bookshelves converging into nothingness, and to the right, the bookshelves also continue onward forever.

I hear faint footsteps coming from in front of me. I turn my head forward, but see nothing. What are those footsteps coming from? Are they looking for me?

There's no point in trying to hide. In this monotonous stretch of books, there is no safety.

I continue walking forward through the aisle of bookshelves. I walk into another hallway, and looking left, I see the familiar wooden table and chairs. The same old reed-bound book is lying on the table, except it is lying with the pages facing up, and a chair is slid out beneath the table there. Why would the same book appear again? Is this the same nightmare? When I finish reading it, will the Endermen appear again, chasing me until I fall into the void?

There isn't any point in making a choice. I could read any book in this library, couldn't I? It won't change what's going to happen next, whatever that is. At least if I continue to read the same book, I will at least continue where I left off. It is a dull read, but its presence is familiar, reassuring me from the uncertainty of a nightmare.

I walk to the chair in front of the book, and sit in it. Then I pick up the book from the table, noticing the flint pen below it. The book is already open to the first page, so I continue to read it again, struggling with the faint Latin alphabet:

"That second part of crafting, the metaphysical, is often fatally underestimated by most researchers. I hope that this journal can help prove that what we perceive and what we think is just as important to crafting as the materials we use and the ways we arrange them.

"Crafting is often thought to be an exact science, but I believe that it is only society's conformity to set crafting standards that causes it to be so steady, linear, and frankly, unfruitful. Our false sense of certainty is creating a mental barrier between us and incredible new possibilities.

"What possibilities are we missing from crafting if, as an example, we continue to turn our heads away from the amazing abilities of the undead? We have done so for many thousands of years. How long are we going to deny that our technological limitations are being limited by our frame of mind? How many tools will we fail to discover to improve the quality of our lives? When was the last time a new set of armor was invented? Eighteen thousand years ago! When was the last time a new pickaxe was invented? Twenty-five thousand years ago!"

I try to think back on my history class when I was a kid. How long ago was it that they said the Diamond Pickaxe was invented? Thirty-something thousand years ago? That must mean that this book is around ten thousand years old, perhaps a quarter of the age of Minecraftia itself!

How is it possible that I am reading a book so old? It should have been destroyed by now, and if not, why isn't it more well-known? Then again, if this book really does exist outside of this dream, it won't be longer than a couple hundred years before the Latin alphabet is completely replaced with Standard. By then, nobody will know how to read books like these any more, and they will be forgotten. I may be one of the last people to read it.

I continue to read.

"This book does not provide a comprehensive list of new crafting recipes, nor does it attempt to predict what technology will be discovered next. Instead, this book seeks to change the frame of mind in which we understand crafting. It seeks to do this in the following ways:

"First, it briefly summarizes the most important events in the history of crafting, from its origins in the mid-Primordial Age, to its widespread adoption in the Age of Diamond, and its institutionalization early in our contemporary Age of Redstone. It explains how these events influenced and were driven by social norms, and the general pattern of controversial discoveries driving increasing public desire for conformity in crafting standards.

"Second, it describes the anomalies in the pattern. The discovery of new means of crafting outside of the crafting bench itself will be addressed, as well as the varying levels of difficulty of their adoption as their use conflicted with established social norms and ways of life. The most important crafting discoveries independent from the World Organization of Crafting will also be explained.

"Third, it addresses some of the many forms of occult magic which have attempted to bridge the gap between crafting knowledge and individual material needs. The controversy surrounding them will be explained, as well as the risks and benefits of different forms of magic.

"Fourth, it presents the first-hand journal accounts of independent crafticians involved in historically important research related to these three subjects, uncensored and unabridged. This comprises, by far, the largest portion of this book, but it is by far the least comprehensive, and it is with great difficulty and care that they have been selected."

That is where the introduction of the book ends. I turn over to the next page, and see handwriting in the Latin alphabet scrawled with flint on a blank buffer page.

"Liars, all of them! This book may seem ahead of its time, but don't let that fool you! It's cleverly disguised propaganda made by the filthy pigs at WOC, silencing opposition by reassuring those who are doubtful and exposing independent crafters to the public and tearing them down! The WOC knows nothing, but they make the people think they know everything...

"Everything the WOC says they invented was stolen... the 'independent' discoveries are the ones they weren't able to cover up.

"To whoever is reading this, don't believe what this book says. If you think the WOC knows better after you've read this, read my note at the end when you're finished."

Whoever wrote that note must hate the WOC... I don't really understand why the WOC is such a big deal. It's not like they have governing authority over anybody. What is this strange reader so concerned about? Out of curiosity, I turn to the last page of the book, finding the handwritten note on the back of the blank page separating the text from the cover.

"There are two facts that are terribly wrong in this book. First is the assumption that new technologies were highly controversial at first and that the WOC had to facilitate their adoption. Second is the assumption that most of the crafting research going on within the WOC is good, and most of the crafting research going on outside the WOC is evil. These assumptions are entirely false. If you believe these two things, all of the WOC's other arguments become indisputable facts. If you see the error in these claims, the WOC's circular argument falls apart...

"As a magician outside of that bureaucracy, I recognize that the WOC is trying to crush people like me so that it can maintain its reign of mediocrity. It is simultaneously seizing power and preventing the most extraordinary power from being achieved. It is preventing the germination of power so great that it could change Minecraftia forever. I am at the cusp of discovering power far beyond our wildest dreams, and yet the WOC waits at my doorstep..."

This magician must be crazy... I don't see how any of those claims could be pulled out of a book like this. If anything, this book seems to be advocating the exact sort of change that he wants... except for, maybe, his obsessive quest for power. Why would the WOC even care about him? If the WOC is really as powerful as he says it is, what did he do that made the WOC want to go looking for him? What sort of power is he so worried about?

I close the book, but not the questions, and then set it down on the table again. I stand up, slowly, expecting a warm body to lean against my back. Instead, I feel myself losing balance. The bookshelves around me blur, making it hard to focus. I expect the floor to fall out from underneath me, but instead my legs go numb, and then all of the world seems to turn to blackness.


	21. Chapter 20: Untruth

"Have you left the dream, my friend?" the Book speaks.

My thoughts are dominated by an awful headache. I feel incredibly tired, my foremost wish being to go back to sleep again, but I strain myself to stay awake so that I can listen to what the Book has to say.

"Do not worry about staying awake. I am capable of communicating with you regardless whether or not you are asleep."

I feel relieved, letting my body relax back into the comfortable position which I had maintained in my sleep. Alright, I'm listening.

"You saw earlier what Dan thinks of me?"

I think back on the conversation Dan and I had before I went to bed. He seemed really worried.

"He despises me. He's afraid of me. He sees me as a threat to your existence... which is, of course, consequently a threat to your own."

I reluctantly accept the Book's interpretation. A part of me feels repulsed by the idea of being so dependent upon the Book, and so easily influenced by its thoughts... but that part of me is selfish and naive. What else am I supposed to believe?

"Don't be fooled. His compassion for you focuses on a small aspect of your identity. He sees the rest of you as a monster, a consciousness to be repressed out of selective compassion for that small part of you. He wants to influence your consciousness as he sees fit. Does that sound like worry to you?"

Well... no. I mean, that's not exactly what I meant, but you're right, that doesn't exactly sound like worry.

"Exactly. So, now that we've come to the obvious conclusion of Dan's intentions, can you see the urgency of the situation? There's simply no way that Dan will enchant the skeleton armor. You must do it yourself."

Ah, yes. The armor. It's about time that it finally be enchanted. It's unfortunate that Dan can't do it for us, but it's in my hands now.

I feel as if a weight has been lifted from my body. The pain of the headache fades to a pleasant coolness, and I feel my muscles tense as my resolve solidifies, overcoming the blanket of tiredness. I open my eyes, seeing a plain ceiling of grey, jagged grooves, cast in deep shadow as the yellow paint of light thickens as it approaches its enigmatic, rocky source. A sense of vitality prompts me to lift my back up from underneath the covers. I carefully slip out to the left, mindful to keep the sheets on Jonas' side covered on top of his ever-present cloak.

Before I walk towards the door, I listen carefully to the silence with my ears, mindful of footsteps and voices. Everything is absolutely still. With caution, I approach the doorway, mindful of the infinitely louder tap that each of my footsteps make in the silence. I eventually reach for the door, and grasp the doorknob gently. To my relief, the door is already cracked slightly open, so with care, I slowly pull the doorknob inward towards the room. The hinges of the door begin to groan. I abruptly let go of the knob. This is not good. There's no question that Dan heard that tiny sound. He'll probably come looking for me soon. I have to move quickly.

The opening in the doorway is just big enough for me to slide through. I listen again for footsteps, but I still only hear silence. I slide sideways out the door and into the narrow hallway. The door on the other side, which leads to Dan's bedroom, is left cracked open. Is Dan inside? Is he asleep? What if he finds me?

"Don't let yourself be overcome by fear. A hard heartbeat is easier to hear... and nervous thoughts make you clumsy."

I know... it's just that... I feel so uncomfortable doing this. It's not like me to keep secrets... to sneak around at night without being seen.

"Now's not the time to question your honor. Let's keep focused on our goal: to enchant the armor."

Right, of course.

I look to the left, where the hallway leads to a dead end, and then to the right, where the staircase leads up to the library floor. I walk towards the stairs, mindful that with every step my foot rocks gently against the floor. I listen carefully to the still air, trying to pick out a sound. It is perfectly quiet.

As I walk onto the first step, I stretch my neck to see up the staircase. There is only the bottom of the wooden bookshelves, and not a sound. My chest feels as if it's filled with hot tar. Dan is going to spot me, I just know it! But I have to try...

I keep my head low. I tense my leg as I gradually lift my weight onto the next step, and with relief as my weight becomes focused on that foot, I lift the next foot up, and then the next, until the rows of bookshelves, with their hidden and many-tongued secrets, lower into view. I carefully peek to the left of the bookshelf in front of me, and see only the parallel shelves of books and flasks. I suppose it's safe enough to walk through.

As I step slowly, I look at the strange contents of the shelves. The letters on the bindings are written in strange ways; many are bordered in intricate, vine-like designs, and the color of some seems so artificially bright that the words seem to glow. Many books seem old, tattered, and faded, yet a surprising number of the old ones are written in Standard, although the lettering is unevenly proportioned, and the corners of the letters are more rounded like the Latin script.

I read the titles of some of the books as I pass slowly by. "Humans and Monsters." "Spawning Mechanics, Eighth Edition." "Understanding Village Culture." "The Hostility Divide." "Reverse Psychology." "The Mining Race." "Redstone and the Body." "Metaphysics of Crafting." "Canine Intelligence."

I feel my heart drop as I hear the coarse grinding of stone. The secret passageway must be opening!

A faint light appears on my left through the gaps in the books. I hear footsteps coming from that direction. I crouch down and squint as I try to see down the staircase. I see the waving grey fabric of Dan's cloak as he walks through the hall and towards the stairs. His pale face underneath his grey hood seems serious and wary as he walks briskly up the stairs. Does he know I'm here?

I hold my breath and tense myself in place, hoping that he doesn't walk through the bookshelves. As he reaches the top of the steps, he turns left towards the other staircase. I try to slowly sidestep right, timing my steps with his own. I reach the right end of the bookshelf, and crouch around its edge to wait behind it. I risk a glimpse to the right side of the bookshelf at Dan, as he walks away from me, behind the bookshelf, and down the stairs, with his shoes echoing on the narrow walls.

He seems to have left the secret passageway open. He'll probably come back soon to close it, so I better walk down there quickly before he notices me.

After waiting a short while for Dan's footsteps to fade, I quickly crouch toward the staircase, and carefully step down into the cool air of the hallway. I see the wide table again, but this time the chair is situated all the way in against the table, and there is only an ink stand and a closed book aligned neatly parallel with the edges of the table. Dan must have finished investigating the bones that were there earlier.

There are three passageways ahead, one on each wall. I know the one on the right leads to the kitchen, so I should try the one in the middle first.

I walk slowly around the table as I approach the passage. My back feels tense, expecting a sound to come from behind. I quicken my pace. The narrow hallway begins to descend as the floor turns to stairs. I feel a chill coarse up my throat as I am blinded by a white light, which takes the shape of a letter of the Standard alphabet. The angular pattern becomes ingrained in my thoughts; its orderly existence brings a sense of pleasant calmness. As the letter pulls away and the blinding light fades, I am tantalizingly drawn to follow it with my sight, until the letter descends into the flowing pages of a leather-bound tome, floating upon an obsidian pedestal adorned with diamonds.

Many other white letters seem to dance upon the pages and disappear into them, while other letters descend into the dance from books crammed into ceiling-high shelves surrounding me. The beautiful light-play could not be created by anything else but magic. The jittering letters seem to represent an ideal sense of being, knowledge without painful memories, wisdom without guilt. The tome below them emanates a power which instills in me a conviction that it cannot be anything else but a tome of enchantment.

I feel a hand grasp my shoulder. In panic, I grab the hand and push it off of me. I turn around, and lock eyes with Dan's vibrant blue irises. My stomach seems to flip over.

Dan gazes contemplatively. A silver sheen seems to glint from his eyes. Suddenly I feel hopelessly guilty, as if he has penetrated deep into my mind and is sifting through my memories.

"What have I done? I'm so sorry!" I feel soreness in my eyes as my sight becomes blurred with tears. I try to cough out the terrible burden of the guilt. My legs lock in defeat.

Dan's eyebrows lift, his eyes opening wide. "What wrong? Get a grip, man! Stop crying!"

Wait, he's not angry at me? Why? I'm so confused...

I take in a deep breath and wipe the tears from my eyes with my fingers. "I don't understand..."

"Don't understand what?" says Dan. "Did I do something wrong?"

"No, it's just... I was trying to enchant something."

"Oh, that's no big deal!" Dan's mouth curls slightly into a smile. "I can enchant it for you if you want, whatever it is."

"Wait, what?" His response gets me completely off-guard. "You mean, you'd be willing to enchant my armor, just like that? You're not suspicious that the Book helped me make it, or the fact that I'm sneaking around here in the middle of the night?"

Dan eyes me with sarcastic disbelief, one brow raised as he glances at me sideways, smiling even more. "You've entirely misjudged me. I'm not quite that high-strung, my good friend. So, you want me to enchant your armor for you? Is that all?"

"Well... yea. I guess it is."

How is this possible? Dan isn't suspicious at all? He doesn't care about the fact that the Book has influenced me to do this, after all he knows about what's happened to me?

As Dan looks coolly at me, I feel temporarily detached from the existence of the Book. Somehow, by going against the Book's predictions, through that little offer of kindness, Dan liberated me from the seemingly unshakable permanence of the Book's truth. He really is here to help me, isn't he?


	22. Chapter 21: The Enchantment

Dan lifts his hand up to the rim of his hood, and pulls it back to reveal his wiry grey hair. He crosses his hands and stretches his arms downward, creating a loud cracking of his knuckles. He looks at me. "Why don't you give me your helmet first?" He brings his hand forward towards me, palm turned upward.

My shoulders tense slightly. Am I sure I can trust him with this? What if this is some sort of trick for him to take it away from me?

It's just the helmet, though. As long as I'm wearing some of the armor, he won't be able to take away the whole set.

I lift my fingers up to my head, holding them still for a moment, hesitant, then I grasp the base of the leather around the neck, and slowly pull it off. I feel the inside of the helmet squeeze against my head, followed by a soothing coolness, as the sweat trapped beneath it becomes re-exposed to the open air.

I place the helmet gently into Dan's palm. It gives way to it in a moment in response to the weight, and for a moment I feel as if he is about to drop it, but then Dan lifts it and turns around. He walks up to the pedestal, holding the helmet above the tome. I walk to the right side of the pedestal, to get a better sense of what he's doing.

Dan's eyes shift from side to side, slowly reading the words in the tome. The floating white letters settle near the opening of the tome, arranging themselves into orderly rows. Dan's eyes shift progressively faster and faster, until it seems he is reading faster than humanly possible, then a bright white glow emanates from his eyes, obscuring his pupils and illuminating his pale skin, as his body seems to acquire a rigid posture not unlike death. I feel a nauseating chill. Then, the letters above the book lift upward. Dan takes a deep breath. As he speaks, his voice seems amplified by newfound confidence, clarified by an aura of authority.

"Imbue, Shrink, Darkness, Earth..."

I am not sure what he means, but the enthusiasm with which he says it makes me envious. There is an unexplainable power in his words which makes me wish I could always emanate words with such great power whenever I speak. Surely, if I could utilize such power within my own words, crafted into coherent sentences, they would be so persuasive as to command others to my whim! I could achieve true greatness, become a revered and adored leader in the eyes of so many others, and obtain pure and never-ending happiness!

Then, the whiteness of Dan's eyes fades, and with it, the memory of the words and their power. The faint memory of the words turns from pleasure into disgust, their potential unreachable. The glowing white letters ascend into the helmet, causing it to shine for a moment, then fade. A flowing purple sheen rises from its surface.

Dan's rigid posture relaxes. His head tilts downward as his hand hovers over the purple sheen. "Knockback." His eyebrows clump together for a moment. "That's very unusual." He pulls his hand back and turns to face me, handing me the helmet. My hands are soaked in the tingliness of its magic. I lift it above my head and pull it on. The feeling of the helmet exudes a strange numbness on my skin, like the tingling feeling I felt when I first crafted it, except much stronger, and without dissipating. The numbness accumulates, making me feel weak, clouding my senses and my ability to concentrate in a dreamy fog.

I faintly notice Dan's hand pushing against my shoulder. "You're leaning, buddy!" He says. "Are you alright? The magic seems to be taking quite a toll on you."

I clench my fists, lean away from Dan, and focus on standing erect. The enchantment must continue. "Don't worry, I'm fine." My voice sounded much weaker than I wanted it to. I try harder to speak again. "I'm FINE."

Dan sighs and shakes his head. "Alright, then. Hand me another piece. But don't ask too much of yourself."

I reach behind my back and undo the leather straps underneath my chestplate that hold it in place. The knot is tight from wearing it for so many days, and my mind struggles to comprehend the feeling of my fingers as they pass over the small bumps. I tug in several places until I finally feel the knot give way. I pull the straps apart and pull the chestplate forward and through my arms. I feel tremendous relief as the air cools the sweat trapped under my shirt. I hand the chestplate to Dan.

Dan hovers it over the pedestal, and the process of enchantment begins again. His eyes glean faster and faster over the tome, and, like a bolt of electricity, the illumination of his eyes causes the frame of his body to suddenly stiffen. He utters a strange phrase which enamors me with its power, then the letters rise into the chestplate, and then it is over.

Dan looks at me in the eye with caution. He hands it to me slowly.

I grasp the numbing surface of the chestplate. I put one arm through and feel a strange soreness pulse up my muscle. Then I put the other arm through and tie the leather straps behind my back. The air feels heavy in my lungs, and despite my deep breaths, I feel like I'm suffocating. My stomach feels sore and restless, making me want to barf. The weakness I felt before becomes amplified; my eyes feel sore from trying to focus on my surroundings.

I try to ignore the suffering I feel from the magic leeching my strength away. I have to power through this. I step out of my boots, and pull my leg armor down. I hand the leg armor to Dan. His brows tilt in concern, but he lifts it above the pedestal anyway. His eyes glow, his body stiffens, his unreachable words ignite my greed, and the letters ascend into the leather and bone. He turns toward me, but hesitates.

"Are you SURE you want to go through with this?" Dan asks. "We can stop at any time and finish enchanting later. I'm really worried about what the magic is doing to you. You don't look good at all."

"No, we have to finish the enchantment now!"

I try to regain my composure. "Don't worry, I can handle this. I've already muscled through half of my armor. Let's finish what we started."

I grab the armored pants out of his hands and pull my feet into them. The numbness in my legs causes them to feel heavier than normal. I feel dizzy. The air around me jiggles, distorted with fuzziness. The ground seems to tilt beneath me like a sailboat. I feel my consciousness starting to slip, but I resist it, focusing on my surroundings. I hand the boots to Dan.

He grins briefly. "I'm surprised you're still awake." He holds the boots over the pedestal. "Don't make me regret this." He begins reading the pages.

His eyes glow, stiffening his frame. Except this time, he doesn't say anything. He just stares into the tome.

I feel a cold chill coarse up my back, into my shoulder, and through my arm. I see a bright light precipitating from my fingertips. Several letters swim out from the cold light, hovering towards Dan, then dropping into the tome of enchantment, as the pages of the tome flip loudly and rapidly from side to side.

Dan turns to face me, emotionless, his eyes still illuminated with deathly white light. "Fristad..."

The personal direction of that one word surprises me. I feel drawn to its power once more, now amplified with meaning that enchants me with happiness, pulling into my mind a desire to absorb every word which will follow with the trust of a loyal friend.

"You cannot escape me. Our fates our permanently intertwined. When I promised you greatness, I meant it. Enchanting the armor was the first step. Now, it is time for you to first taste what we've worked so hard for. Your future will fulfill the very wish for power you desire. You will achieve greatness. All creatures, alive and undead, will bow to your influence. Your power shall grant you unending happiness. However, for all this to happen, you must trust me. You must be willing to overcome difficult trials along your path to greatness, and I shall be your guide. Disregard the doubts you place on your sanity, for they will weaken your resolve."

Was that the Book speaking? Did it just take control of Dan? How is that possible? I know it's trying to influence me... but somehow I can't argue against the validity of its claims. If the Book can make me feel this way, against the moral fiber I remember once resonated so much with my being, than who's the say the Book can't influence other people as well? The book is my friend... it's only natural that it would want to share its power with me. Why must it feel so wrong?

Back to Dan. How is it possible that the Book took control of Dan, yet Dan was able to weaken the influence of the Book earlier? Were they engaged in some sort of invisible, metaphysical battle? But then, why didn't Dan show any sign of distress? Is it possible that the Book's consciousness is really Dan?

"No, you idiot!" The eyes-glowing body of Dan says. "Isn't it obvious that Dan's a surrogate? Pass Go three times, then try again." Dan's head turns forward again. "... and don't mention this conversation to Dan!"

The glowing white light in Dan's eyes fades, freeing his muscles to relax. The letters ascend into the boots, illuminating them in a purple sheen.

The final piece of enchanted armor is complete.

Dan turns to face me. "If it makes you feel any better, all this enchanting is quite a toll on me, too." He smiles sympathetically. "You look absolutely exhausted. Please be careful, and do get some rest." He hands the boots to me.

"...with the armor taken OFF," he adds.

I slide the boots on. They make my feet feel sore, but the physical toll they put on me brings me only slightly closer to unconsciousness.

"Thank you, Dan."

"You're welcome," he replies. "Although, it is also a risk you are welcome to take."

I turn around and walk up the stairs.

"Don't underestimate magic," Dan says as I walk away. "... or you may become as crazy as I am!"

I chuckle as I walk past the table with the ink stand and the closed book. What a character Dan is! I'm surprised Dan enchanted the armor, considering how worried he was about me when I first talked to him about the Book with Jonas. He didn't even seem to care! What is up with that?

I walk up another stairway into the library, through the bookshelves and down a third narrow staircase. I take a left, walk down the hallway, and open the first door on my left. I see Jonas sleeping, the covers of the bed another layer of cloth carefully concealing him, as the eerie yellow light speckles the bedroom.

I struggle to breathe, catching my breath from the short walk that felt like a two-mile sprint. Dan's probably right. It's best for me to take off my armor, so that I can recover my strength. I can put it back on in the morning.

But, by tomorrow morning, someone could steal it while I'm asleep. And then, I would never be able to go outside again. How could I possibly risk that? It's safer for me to just keep my armor on. Besides, it provides me incredible protection. It's an invaluable resource. Who knows when I might need it?

I decide to keep the armor on, in spite of the terrible weakness it makes me feel. I walk to the right side of the bed, climb underneath the pillows, and close my eyes.

For some reason, despite my weakness, my mind won't rest long enough to let me sleep. The numbing magic of the armor seems to buzz in my ears, filling my thoughts with restless activity, filling my consciousness with grey noise and irrational worry.

A cool sensation grows in my feet, until my toes feel freezing cold. The chill then creeps up my legs, shoots up my spine, and flows up my neck, before propagating throughout my body, stronger than ever.

My eyes are forced open in shock, and I see an incredibly bright light.


	23. Chapter 22: Troubled Perception

It is a yellow light, far brighter than even the sun on the hottest of Summer days. Yet, despite its brightness, it does not singe my eyes in pain, and stop at the cornea, but it instead penetrates far deeper, reaching my fundamental perception of light. The brightness shocks me from any hope of sleep.

Why this? Is it a nightmare made of light, denying me the comfort of at least understanding the fear that the dream forces into me?

I realize that I am laying down with the reflection of the light off every angle of the room flowing into my vision. I lean forward and turn my head to the left, trying to avoid direct contact from the strangely bright yellow light. The blankets slide forward as I try to collect my settling thoughts. The vertical ridges of the grey wall inches from my head provides a dull but calming surface with which I clean my thoughts from the uneasiness which the light makes me feel. I try to reassure myself of the finite nature of my sleep-induced fear before attempting, reluctantly, to assess my surroundings.

I turn my head to the right to better understand the strangely amplified light's effect on the room. In the bottom right corner of my vision, Jonas lays fast asleep, his black eyelids concealing what one would expect to be a purple glow. Everything else, however, seems brighter than usual. The crevasses in the shelves on the far wall are clearly illuminated; the wrinkled stone between the books take up a larger surface area of the shelf on the far wall than I recall. I glance to Jonas' left in loathing anticipation towards the stone floor, where the glowstone in the center appears molten from the incredible light. It must be glowing brighter from some sort of magic.

Why didn't the bright light wake Jonas up? Perhaps he's so used to having all that purple glowing light within his eyes, that he doesn't mind the light coming from outside of them all that much.

What exactly is happening to the glowstone that's making it glow so brightly?

I slide out to the left, bringing the blankets on my side of the bed up to the edge of the pillow. I walk around the bed, strafing towards the strange glowing stone. Its bright light seems to only emanate from itself and nothing else; there is no evidence of glowing smoke from any source of magic. And yet, just looking into the stone makes me feel uncomfortably warm... even more so than I recall feeling from the heat being trapped underneath my thick armor. Perhaps the magic of the enchantment is getting to me.

Maybe Dan would know why the glowstone is behaving so oddly. I should ask him.

I turn around, away from the molten light, and open the door. I walk across the hall to Dan's room, and slowly crack open his door, cautious to not wake him on the off-chance that he's asleep. I am jarred by the glowstone light on his bedroom floor, which is just as bright as the glowstone in the room I was sleeping in. Just beyond the glowstone is a wide bed, with plenty of room for two people to sleep comfortably. The blankets on the left side are folded and crumpled back, revealing the sheet covering the mattress.

Dan isn't here.

I look around the room briefly, curious of what it looks like in the bright light. It is a bigger room than the one Jonas and I are sleeping in. To the left of the bed is a desk covered in many open books halfway read, profusely thick with innumerable pages. Underneath the desk, a wooden chair is slightly turned outward from its pushed-in position. In front of the desk, several large chests line against the wall. The opposite wall is lined with a well-filled, ceiling high bookshelf. How in the world can one man have so many books? How does Dan even have time to read them all? One would think that, with the amount that he has, Dan would know more about them than the sentient creatures he specializes in, so it's odd that he wouldn't understand how to handle the Book.

Perhaps Dan is studying over in one of the rooms behind the secret passageway.

I back out of the room, closing the door in front of me, and head down towards the right end of the hallway, where the narrow stairs hug against the earth. I ascend them, less wary of the sound that my footsteps make on the dry stone, and more perplexed by how well-lit the stairwell is.

The secretive rows of bookshelves lower into view. I walk into the leftmost aisle, and approach the other end of the room, where a passage underneath a painting should be. As the leftmost bookshelf parts from my line of sight, I glance left. The opening is no longer there, replaced by a neat corner where the stone of the wall and the floor meet seamlessly, as if the opening was never there.

That's odd. It seems Dan isn't in his study. Perhaps he's upstairs in the foyer, or even outside?

I turn around and head back down the aisle, every wall and crevasse unusually bright. The sources of the light, multiple squares of glowstone in the space of the ceiling between bookshelves, appear molten as well. I take a left where the bookshelf ends, where I briefly see the many chests, including the strange dark Ender chest, whose purple glow seems to illuminate the wall far more than I remember.

Everything is brighter. What is wrong with this house?

I circle around the corner to the right, where a staircase leads up to the foyer. I ascend it, my boots echoing their collision with the stone onto the narrow walls. I step up towards the back right corner of the small, arid room lined with cobblestone walls, and turn around to face the center of the room.

The foyer, too, is bright as day. On the center table, the tiny, yellow flickering flame of the torch shrinks from perhaps half a hand's length to but a speck, yet even at its smallest moment, the walls of the room remain brightly illuminated by the sunlight streaming inside from the rectangular sliver of space between the door and its stone frame. An outline of dust surrounding the sliver of light glows in rays of blue, struggling back and forth with the flickering torch to control the color of the walls.

Is it daytime already? I suppose I wouldn't have been able to tell from underground. Maybe Dan put a spell on the lights to make them glow brighter in the morning to help him wake up... yet I only recall him being in the rooms beyond the hidden stone passage just a few minutes ago. It's possible that I passed out without realizing it. After all, the newly enchanted armor made me exhausted when I first put it on.

I step towards the lit frame of the front door, and reach for the knob. A heavy tiredness persists in my body as the magic of the armor continues to drain my energy, while a cold restlessness clings to my limbs, preventing me from slipping into sweet, rejuvenating sleep. My nervous thoughts reject it like a poison, even though my being requires it. My eyes remain glued open, forced to stare upon the vertical sliver of blue light as it is stretched open by the rotating door. A ball of white light appears from the right side of the sky, halfway between the horizon and the apex. The sky is a bright blue, yet, strangely enough, all the stars are visible.

I close the door behind me. This can't be right. I must be in some sort of dream where light is all screwed up. No wonder I can't close my eyes.

And yet... something else is missing.

I walk slowly across the field and scan across the horizon, noting the presence of various zombies, skeletons, and spiders roaming between the sparse run-down shacks, as well as the occasional creeper, all illuminated in light they should not be able to spawn in.

Why do I get the irksome feeling that everything is quieter than it should be?

The silence is broken by footsteps breaking into the dry grass behind me. I turn around and, to my bitter surprise, I see a skeleton with a bow in hand, with an arrow already drawn with the same hand. It hasn't aimed at me yet.

My arm instinctively reaches for the sword at my belt... only to discover that there's only the leather hilt.

Where did my sword go? I must have lost it when I...

"Hello there," a voice inexplicably coming from the skeleton greeted.

Hold on... did it just... did this pile of floating dead bones just talk?

"Holy cow!" I blurt out. "You can talk!"

"Oi, you can talk too!" it replies, then tilts its skull back to the side. "...bloody idiot. When in the Nether did you spawn? Just twenty minutes ago?"

"What are you talking about?"

Does my armor really make me look that much like a skeleton? I glance down at my leg armor... and my eyes are caught on the mass of ivory joints floating outside of my sleeve near the place where my right hand should be. The slender bones flex apart as my mind focuses on them.

No, this can't be possible! Have I turned into a monster? Why did I deserve this?

The bright light... I understand now. That was night vision, wasn't it? And the silence is because my heart is... my chest is... and I can't close my eyes because...

I lift my ivory hand up to my eyes, and reach my fingers towards where my eyelids should be. I cannot help but flinch as the bony remnants of my fingers reach pass the point where they ought to stop. My vision of the bones reaching into my skull becomes fuzzier until I hear a hollow tap coming from the back.

My skull is... hollow. I don't have eyelids or a brain. My chest is probably a heartless hollow cavern... and I probably have no organs to speak of. I'm just a mass of floating bones suspended in space and animated by dark magic coming from Notch-knows-where. I'm...

I clench my skull hopelessly from the cheekbone. "I'm dead!"

"No, you're UNdead," the skeleton corrects me. "It's a fate slightly less worse than death." It tilts its bow upward for a moment, as a casual gesture. "You must be one of those humans that just got infected. I can tell you're not in your element."

I shake my head, still stunned at what I've just become. "That doesn't make sense. It wasn't like I was killed by a skeleton or anything like that."

"Well, at SOME point, you were infected, not that I care about the details. The more pressing issue at the moment..." the skeleton points its ivory arm at me, "... is that you need a bow."


	24. Chapter 23: Conflict Resolution

The skeleton lifts the slender bones of its hand, waving them in a beckoning motion. "... and I know just the place you can get one. Follow me."

The skeleton turns to my right and begins to move, its joints precariously swinging from underneath its hips, the scenery of the night clearly visible between the floating bones encircling its ribcage.

Something about the creature seems depressingly barren and incomplete. Is this the unnatural existence that I lead now? It seems too sudden. After a brief nap, I've transformed into something I terribly despise, something I've so frequently and gladly slain with the edge of my sword. It is terribly ironic that this skeleton, that same creature which I have slain, would gladly help me find a weapon.

I follow after the skeleton as its unpadded bone feet knock into the brittle earth, at a loss of what else to do. I hope that this is all just a dream, yet the longer I walk behind the skeleton, the less sure I am that it is one. My perceptions of my surroundings are far too detailed, and my thoughts are far too clear, for this to truly be a dream.

After walking a few dozen meters, the skeleton stops to turn around and face me, its arrow still readied against the bowstring. The skeleton stretches itself more upright, exuding a sense of purpose. "You are probably wondering, at this point, why you came to transform into a skeleton. You may have begun to question your social obligations to your human kin, but your human memories are too strong to let you give them up."

The skeleton is, in a way, right on the money, but it implies that my moral obligations to humanity are objective. My new physical form may change how this skeleton perceives me, but it doesn't change who I am.  
I clench my fists tight, trying to convey the anger my face cannot. "If you think that I can give up my friends that easily, then you are gravely mistaken."

"Oh, I'm sure you'll give up your friends quite easily. Such sympathy is predictably short among the newly spawned, once they realize the irreconcilable differences between them and their former kin." The creature seems to relish the words like a carefully recited speech. It rubs the ivory fingers of its free hand against the bowstring. "This likely comes as an extremely unpleasant shock to you, but luckily, I have developed an amusing game to help you soothe over your uneasiness, while you simultaneously learn to use your most essential weapon. We'll kill two birds with one stone sword, as the humans would say... although I much prefer the phrase, 'kill two men with one arrow.'"

The skeleton rolls its skull back and begins to chuckle, its grunts causing the discs of its spine to rattle. It turns its back to me, facing forward and slightly to the right. The tiny bones of its hand rise up to beckon me closer to it.

I walk up to it, somewhat worried of what the skeleton may be planning to make me do.

"Now, do you see that guard over there, standing idly on the road?"

I follow the skeleton's line of sight to the road, where a guard stands, dressed in full-body iron armor and wielding a bow, with arrow in hand. I nod.

"That one's worth fifty points. Any guard's worth ten points, plus an additional ten points for each piece of armor they're wearing. Villagers are twenty points." It lifts its bow up to eye level, taking aim. "I take three shots to try and kill as many as I can, and then we alternate. Whoever gets the most points before sunrise wins. How's that sound?"

I say nothing, looking at the guard standing still, oblivious of the arrowhead pointed at his neck. If the skeleton tries to shoot at him now, he will likely get killed.

The skeleton strengthens its grip on its arrow.

I can't just stand back and let the skeleton kill him.

I sprint to its left, reach for its arrow, and grab onto it tight, prying it from the bow. The skeleton jerks the bow away from me.

"What do you think you're doing?" The skeleton says. "You can't just pull my arrow away like that while I'm trying to aim. That's cheating!"

The skeleton hovers its hand parallel to the bow, massaging the air gently with its bony fingers. Faint red sparks fall from its fingertips, landing upon a predetermined invisible plane next to the bow. The red sparks become progressively brighter and more numerous as they accumulate, until they coalesce into a narrow glowing rod, which cools into the shape of a wooden shaft, with a deadly sharpened flint at one end, and smoothly shaped feathers at the other. It is a perfectly crafted arrow, conjured from nothing. The skeleton plucks it from the air and slides it into position, as rapidly and as naturally as if the bowstring offers no resistance. The entire process is silent.

The skeleton aims its new arrow at the guard again. I let go of the old arrow and grab onto the bow, using my weight to pull it down. The skeleton lets out a groan of surprise, jerks the bow downward and out of my reach, and then pushes my arms away.

"Hey, stop that! Let me shoot it!"

I take advantage of its pause to reach for its bow again. The skeleton pulls it out of my hands before I can get a good grip.

"Are you trying to steal my bow? Because you won't be able to, no matter how hard you try."

"What makes you so sure?" I reply skeptically.

The skeleton lifts its free hand up to eye level, the gaps clearly visible between the tiny floating bones. "Magic."

It lowers its hand to grip the bow again, steadying its aim.

What should I do? Clearly the skeleton won't part from its bow so easily, but if I let the skeleton kill the guard, then I'm letting myself become one of them. Yet, if I try to fight the skeleton, its bow will give it the offensive upper hand.

I suppose I have nothing to lose. At least I'm wearing armor.

I run into the skeleton, colliding into it at its collarbone. I fall on top of it, pushing it to the ground. The skeleton shrieks in surprise and, its bow still loaded correctly despite the impact, fires at an angle. The arrow snaps in half upon my chestplate.

I press my boot upon the skeleton's right arm - the one holding its bow - and draw my fist back. I slam it into the skeleton's jaw... once, twice, three times... each collision rattling its bones. The skeleton struggles to pull its right arm out from underneath me, while it tries to push my shoulder away. I shrug off the skeleton's grip as I draw my arm back for another hit, aiming for the chest this time. The impact of my fist with the skeleton's breastbone causes a resounding crack, followed by the sting of rapidly dissipating magic, then the acrid smell of putrefied flesh. The skeleton's bones decay into dust, as white smoke rises from the grass to consume them.

I pull the bow from the skeleton's limp finger bones. An electric energy flows from the bow into my hand. The shaft fits perfectly in my grasp, as if I had crafted it myself.

I gaze down victoriously into the dissipating white smoke. Your weapon isn't so private when you're dead, is it? Now, go back to your grave.


	25. Chapter 24: A Taste Too Many

I stand up and look behind me. The guard is standing in the exact same place he was before.

A wave of disappointment and frustration flows over me. These aren't my emotions I feel. I reach my right hand into my back pocket, pulling out the Book.

"Why did you do that? The skeleton never wanted to hurt you."

Why does it matter? The skeleton was about to kill that guard.

"That guard would have died anyway if you weren't around to meddle with the situation."

How would it be ethical for me to let the guard die, if I have any power to stop it? Besides, the only reason I'm here is because of you! You're the reason I've transformed into this monster!

"Can you honestly, in good faith, blame me for your transformation when you aren't even sure how it happened? Do you even have a story to back up your claim?"

Well, no, but considering all of the strange things that have happened to me since you've been around, I can hardly imagine anyone else being responsible.

"Strange things?" The Book projects sensible skepticism. "I'm afraid I'm not sure what you mean by 'strange.' Unless you can tell me what strange event caused your transformation, I find no reason to be held responsible."

You're obviously denying it. You know how it happened. It was the armor, wasn't it? You wanted me to enchant the armor, because you knew what the magic would do to me!

"How could an enchantment make armor do that? Armor is designed for wearing, for protection. Enchantment is designed, of course, to make armor more protective... not make the armor transform its wearer into a skeleton. Do you want to know what I think? You over-exerted yourself. You put on the armor too fast, and you couldn't handle the magic. Then, rather than take the armor off like Dan told you to, you slept with it. And guess where that led you? You would have died if you hadn't been infected."

I wouldn't have bothered sleeping with the armor if I weren't so illogically attached to it. You've been manipulating the way I think, forcing me to wear the armor, knowing quite well what it would lead to.

"Since when have I made you think anything? You're thinking right now of your own accord, aren't you? Otherwise, we wouldn't be arguing with each other."

There have been many times where you've manipulated my thoughts. You've given me nightmares, you've made me want to do things I've never wanted to before, and you've made me feel emotions I otherwise wouldn't feel.

"How do you know those weren't really your thoughts you were thinking? Besides, if I really wanted to control your mind, and I had the power to do so, I wouldn't let you think for yourself. I'd be human, my name would be Fristad, and you would not exist. Of course, I would never bother searching for a way to control your mind, because I value your friendship."

That's a bunch of garbage. You plant all sorts of ideas in my head. Also, you're not my friend. Haven't we had this conversation before?

"Yes, and you're not bringing up any new points."

Perhaps we should stop arguing, then.

"I agree, Fristad. But first, let's get to the heart of the matter: you are not human. As a skeleton, you have different obligations, but one obligation does not change: your loyalty to your own kind. You can't run around killing skeletons anymore, because you are one of them. You must cooperate with skeletons in order to survive.

"Believe me, I'm as disappointed by the transformation as you are. However, we need to make the best of the situation that we are in. You must adapt your perception of morality and learn to befriend the creatures of the night. Only then can our plans see fruition."

What plans?

"Only what you have been searching for all along."

Fine, then. Be as vague as you want. I'm done asking questions.

I put the book back into my pocket, and look out towards the road again. An armored guard is walking towards town, but I'm not sure if he's the same guard, because he is carrying a sword. Yet, the guard's presence saddens me. I've destroyed one life to save another, a life very similar to my own.

Should I shoot him, even though he's human, like I was not too long ago?

I feel my fingers curl around an arrow of unknown origin.

It is only fair. I killed a skeleton, so I might as well kill a human to balance the scale.

What kind of screwed-up logic is that, justifying the death of one creature for the death of another? If I want to kill a man, then, Nether's fire, I'm going to do it!

I raise the arrow into position, looking down from the feathers to the flint head, aligning them above the head of the guard as he moves. Fifty points. A rush of excitement causes me to let go of the arrow without thinking, and launch the arrow farther left than I wanted. I watch the arrow cut upward into the air, then plummet downward towards the road. It lands perfectly within the neck of the guard. He stands still for a moment, grasping the foreign object now inside of him, before falling to the side, his sword tumbling onto the ground. I know it should be wrong for me to think this, but... his death satisfies me.

Another guard runs out from the town, this one carrying a bow. He runs off the road towards me, pulling an arrow into position. He sees me; I have no choice but to kill him. I step off to the side, startled, just as he fires and misses, and another arrow materializes in my hand. I push it against the bowstring, aim at the guard, and release. The guard tries to sidestep it, but grunts as the arrow is lodged at the base of his shoulder. He throws his bow down and pulls out an iron sword from his belt. I grasp and launch another arrow at him, this one bouncing off of the thick center of his chestplate without harm. He continues to charge at me, raising his sword above his head. Just as he is no more than a body's length from me, I fire a third arrow into him, this time into his neck. He staggers forward, crashing into me with the momentum of his charge. I step back to keep my balance. The guard lifts his sword weakly before collapsing onto the earth.

I have never killed a man before this night, in part because I've never needed to, in part because it felt wrong to do so. Why is it, then, that it feels so right tonight? Is it because I'm a skeleton? Somehow, that doesn't seem like a sufficient reason. If humans are supposed to be my enemies, then I should have felt like I was acting in self-defense by killing them, even when that first guard walking down the road didn't see me. His death wasn't exactly justified, yet it made me feel a strange satisfaction which I have never felt with such great intensity: the satisfaction of power, the satisfaction of ending another player's turn in the game that is life... permanently.

I gaze upon the fallen guard at my feet, his hand limply lying flat upon his sword. This is far more exciting than the dull life I've been living on the farm. Now that I have acquainted myself with this power, I must find a way to put it to good use. The only problem is that my life has basically started over; I can no longer pursue the wants and desires that evaded me while I was human, because nobody will recognize me. Heck, I can't even have a nice meal or get a good night's sleep, two of the simplest of pleasures. That's depressing. I think I get a vague idea of what that skeleton meant earlier by "irreconcilable differences."

What to do now?

Well, first of all, I should avoid buildings and roads, to reduce the likelihood of getting ambushed. Secondly, I should search for others like me, to get an idea of what to do next.

I turn away from the road and begin to walk further into the field. There isn't a whole lot of method to this plan.

After walking for about a minute, I begin to hear rapid footsteps coming from behind me, as if somebody is running in my direction. I squeeze an arrow from the air and slide it into the bowstring before turning around.

It's Dan in his grey robe, running hurriedly towards me with a worried look on his face. He doesn't look like he wants to hurt me, but with everything that's happened tonight, I wish he'd just leave me alone.

He slows down from his sprint two meters away from me. He breathes heavily, then takes in a deep, slow breath inward. "How's it going, buddy?"

How does Dan recognize me? Perhaps if I act more aggressively, he'll reconsider. I aim my bow and arrow at his head, and let out a threatening hiss. Somehow, this makes Dan grin.

"Come on, Fristad. I know it's you. Also, for the record, skeletons don't make hissing sounds."

I keep my bow lifted, staying silent to make it seem like I don't recognize him. Regardless if he does, it should be pretty obvious that I don't want him around.

"You aren't honestly going to fire that at me, are you?"

Perhaps Dan needs a little bit more persuasion. I let go of the arrow, letting it fly towards him.

Dan lifts his hand up to his face. A purple vortex appears in his palm, swallowing the arrow instantly. The expression on Dan's face goes flat. He pulls out a diamond sword from the flaps of his robe, and holds it outward. "I don't want to fight you, but if you try to kill me, I will defend myself."

I eye the brilliant blue sword with awe. Between that and the magic, Dan's too strong of a match for me. I lower my bow. "How did you know it was me?"

Dan's face breaks into a grin again. "The magic from your enchanted armor was kind of a giveaway." He lowers his sword. "What were you doing out here, anyway?"

"Well, the reason I'm out here in the first place is because I was looking for you, actually. I thought there was something wrong with your house because everything was so bright... until I went outside and realized the brightness was from my night vision from being, well, undead. After that I..." I hesitate for a moment, trying to think of something harmless to say, "...practiced archery."

Dan raises his eyebrow. "Oh, really? In this desolate place? What were you practicing archery on?"

I look around. There really isn't much here. I try to think of something reasonable. "I was practicing archery on the shrubbery."

That probably wasn't the best answer. The way Dan glares at me, I can tell he isn't buying it.

"Are you sure? I don't see any bushes to shoot at..." He looks around him. "...in fact, I don't see any monsters or animals to shoot at, either. So tell me, Fristad, what were you really shooting at?"

"Well, you're right, there isn't really all that much to shoot at, which is why I was shooting at the shrubbery."

Dan continues to stare at me, unconvinced.

"I was bored! Geez, give me a break."

"I don't believe you, Fristad." Dan says plainly. "So, please tell me, and be honest this time: What were you shooting at? If you don't give me a persuasive answer, I'm going to assume the worst."

He sees through my lies. He's going to keep asking me until he gets the real story out of me. I might as well tell him the truth. I sigh in defeat.

"The town guards."

Dan shakes his head. "I had a feeling you were up to no good."


	26. Chapter 25: Some Place Secret

Sunshine trots energetically around Dan's feet, her panting maw lifted upward. As Dan walks up to his front door, Sunshine occasionally bounces off of her forepaws, reaching her soggy nose for Dan's hand. I look behind me, towards the gravel road, for the last time before heading back inside. The town guards have finally vanished. Dead. Respawned. Memories erased.

I cradle a guilt forming within me. A comforting voice inside of me insists that what I have done is just, but an older voice, gradually growing louder, worries that I have broken a sacred rule. But which voice should I trust?

"Good girl!" Dan says in a childish, praising half-squeal. As I turn my head back forward, I see Dan rubbing his hand rapidly upon the husky's shaggy head. Sunshine's head tilts upward, her eyes squinted in a furry bliss. "You did well tonight, sweetheart," Dan's voice drops a couple octaves. "You clever watchdog, you!"

Hmm, I don't think I've ever heard a dog be called "clever" before. It seems a bit out of place to assign such a high mark of intelligence to a four-legged animal. But then again, Dan does seem quite enamored with that dog...

Dan pats Sunshine on her head before lifting his hand away. She gazes expectantly up at him for a moment, letting out a high-pitched whimper, before giving up her pleading and trotting away.

Dan opens the door and enters, leaving it open behind him. I follow Dan inside of the cobblestone shack, closing the door behind me. There is some place where Dan wants to take me.

The torch's glow retains its unearthly brightness, a perception created by my enhanced vision.

I follow Dan down the narrow staircase, into the room with many bookshelves. The glowstone on the ceiling appears molten, just as before, but still just as strange. He leads me behind all of the bookshelves, toward the end of back wall, where the secret passage leads down into the study. He takes me down those stairs, past the desk, and into the hallway on the left, the one I have never entered.

The hallway remains flat, but it is longer than the others. After about half a minute of walking, we follow the turn in the hallway to the right. My jaw drops in admiration. The walls open up into a grand room, roughly as wide as it is long: perhaps 30 meters in each direction. The walls are made of a purplish black stone, similar to the obsidian I've read about in books, and the corners are held up by wooden beams. As we step onto the wooden flooring, I see that the wide gap in the center of the floor leads deep into the earth, where many levels of wooden flooring hang against the walls, connected with staircases made of thin planes of stone bricks. Glowstone is held in place along the top of each corner by the wooden beams. Some walls are entirely covered with chests, others with shelves containing books, vials, jars, unidentifiable artifacts, and other objects too strange to even classify. On the bottom levels, I can see furnaces, crafting benches, cauldrons filled with water, and strange contraptions composed of glowing orange rods held vertically by cobblestone. The great room has a stately, almost ancient quality to it.

As I follow Dan another step forward onto the wooden floor, I suddenly feel a sense of dread from the incredible depth of the room. I see in my mind, vividly, the mistake of me taking another step forward, slipping off the edge into the room's hollow center, falling through the air for what seems like forever, until my bones shatter upon the ground, each ebony shard piercing its presence into me with a pain only death could bring. I feel nervous of the incredible magic locked away in the chests and emanating from the artifacts on the shelves, a magic far too powerful for me to touch. I cannot trust myself to enter this place safely.

I take a step back, looking at Dan. Space appears to wobble around his grey cloak, in much the same way as the smoke above a flame. I see that from him, too, emanates a strong magic. Should I, by accident, absorb just a tiny percentage of his magical energy, I would be overwhelmed by it. On top of the sheer amount of magic from my enchanted armor, which continues to exhaust me to my limit, it could topple my sanity, as if each logical thread within my mind were a domino. It is a responsibility I cannot bear.

Dan notices that I have halted my footsteps, and turns around to face me.

I express my guilt to Dan, looking into his blue eyes with the most apologetic gaze I can express. His previous advice, "Don't underestimate magic," echoes in my mind with fresh meaning.

"I really shouldn't be here," I say, quietly and humbly. "I'm sorry."

Dan's eyebrows lift. "Oh dear," he says, his voice's echoing loudly from the excess magic spilling out of him. "My sincerest apologies; I forgot to remove the ward."

He lifts his hand upward, the fingers wobbling from the smoke-like distortion. He begins to chant a command in an old, formal dialect, roughly translating to: "From now until the sun rises, let Fristad pass." The instant he says this, the smoke-like distortion of the space around him disappears.

"There we go," says Dan, his voice now at a normal volume again. "That should stop the ward from messing with you, although you'll still feel paranoid for a little while. Stay close to the wall and think of puppies."

Puppies? Okay, then.

I follow Dan around the left perimeter of the room, mindful to keep my head facing the wall. My foot nearly slips on the first step of a stone brick staircase, and the sudden jerky motion makes me forget which way is up. I crouch against the wall, in fear that my thin legs will lose traction on the stone, causing me to slip uncontrollably over the edge. I grasp my skull, trying to remind myself that I am covered in a solid, rough substance, not some liquid, frictionless slime. Get a hold of yourself, Fristad. You've never fallen off a staircase before. Remember that the physical world is a logical place.

I force myself to stand up, and continue walking down the steps very slowly, mindful that each step lands precisely in the middle of the stone brick slab.

Dan slows his pace in front of me. "It's alright, Fristad. There's nothing to be afraid of. Besides, I wouldn't have taken you down into this room if I didn't feel it was so important."

I feel slightly more confident, trying to look away from my boots, letting my legs settle into a slow rhythm. So far so good, as long as I watch out for stairs.

And so we proceed very slowly clockwise, my steps still tense from the possibility of falling, until many floors down later, we reach the very bottom, where the floor is covered in stone bricks. There is one large table in the center of the floor with many glowing orange rods standing upright, and along the walls are narrow tables, cauldrons, furnaces, shelves, and a crafting bench in the middle of each wall, discluding the wall against which hangs the staircase we have just descended.

Dan pulls out two backless wooden chairs underneath the center table. He points one hand at the chair closes to me, beckoning me with his other hand to sit on it.

"I'd remark on how you must be tired from the long journey down those stairs, but you don't have muscles with which to be tired." Dan chuckles. "That's just one of the plus sides of being a skeleton... although I doubt it outweighs the fact that you despise being one."

I walk over to sit on the wooden chair, letting my legs lay limply on the floor. The process does not make me feel relieved, but it at least allows me to get my mind off the process of walking. I look up at the levels of wooden walls and spiral staircases stretching upward towards the ceiling. It was difficult enough to get down without falling - I shudder - but I can't imagine trying to do the same thing all over again, except next time, every step will bring me up progressively higher, to more dangerous heights. I force my head down towards the floor, trying to get my thoughts off the idea.

"Still a little jittery, I see?" Dan says, reaching for some empty glass vials on a shelf. "Don't worry; you've gone through the worst of it. Look on the bright side: with a ward that powerful, there's absolutely no chance that anything else can get down here." He grins.

This fact frustrates me. Rather than comfort me, the idea of the ward surrounding us makes me feel isolated. "Why do you even bother having a ward here if it's just going to freak people out?!" I snap.

"Because..." Dan sighs, while dipping the vials into the water of a cauldron, one by one. "...this is where I store my most valuable projects and supplies, stuff that would take a lot of money and magic to replace."

I nod my head. "I suppose that's a pretty good reason. But still, if you had such a powerful ward up, then why did you bother bringing me down here?"

"I need you here for two reasons. First, I need you here to help me make some potions... potions that will help you. And second, I need to ask you a few questions."

I nod again. I can kind of understand why he'd want my help to make the potions; it may have something to do with how the magic works, or maybe he just needs another set of hands.

But the questions... why would he need to ask me something while we're down in this room? Perhaps there is a magic-related reason for that as well. Or perhaps, Dan needs to speak to me in a place where he can know, for certain, that we're alone. Some place secret.


	27. Chapter 26: Diagnosis

Dan places the last of three vials filled with water on the center table, on the side directly opposite of me. He then sits down in front of the vials, and lifts each one onto one of the three cobblestone cups at the base of a glowing orange rod. As it catches my attention, I begin to realize that this glowing rod has an unusual shape. Its tall narrow neck, with columns of stone riding up against it, its upper tips protruding outward, and in the other direction its mass widening and flattening, makes it seem alien... almost organic. Its curvature gives it the appearance of the tall body of some sort of creature... suggestively armless, but not exactly like a Creeper. It looks almost like a fortress, the outline of the stone forming a decorative molding around it.

"What is that thing?" I can't help but say, staring at the strange structure.

Dan nods with his head downward, his eyes watching the orange rod as he places the third vial within the remaining stone bowl. "Nothing less than a brewing stand." He lifts his head up to look at me, his eyes squinted with scepticism. "It brings the heat of the Nether to our world. It's essential for making potions."

"I see..." I debate whether or not I should ask another question. Even though Dan's response doesn't feel like a sufficient explanation, I feel as if I shouldn't say anything. His piercing glare suggests that this place is far too austere for small talk.

This is not the same Dan that I knew five minutes ago.

Dan turns his back to me, and walks toward the shelves on the far wall. His head tilts from left to right, scanning the shelves for something he wants. After about a minute of scanning, his head stops.

"Of all the questions buzzing inside of my head, one keeps coming to the front..." He reaches for several pouches on an upper shelf, walks toward the center table, and sets them down next to the brewing stand. He looks back up at me. "...What were you planning to do after you killed the guards?"

I try to think back on the moment after I killed the second guard, the one who was running toward me with a sword. Somehow, I was confused. I realized that I no longer held a place within normal 'craftian society. I wasn't sure what to do next. The moment already seems fuzzy.

I shake my head. "I'm not sure. I had trouble trying to wrap my head around the fact that I had transformed into a skeleton."

Dan squints his eyes, raising a hand up to his chin. "You seemed much more determined about what you were going to do at the time, much more than you claim now. I was getting the impression that you were trying to avoid me. It appeared almost as if you were trying to run away."

I see, in my memory's eye, the limp body of the fallen guard. Somehow I associate his death with a strange, distant feeling... a feeling that, at that moment, seemed tantalizingly close. I remember walking away from the body. I wasn't exactly scared, but I felt the need to travel somewhere. Exactly where? I'm not sure.

I nod at Dan. "You're right. I was trying to run away. I'm not exactly sure why, but I was."

Dan gives a faint nod of approval. "I thought so. That doesn't answer my other concern, though: why were you trying to avoid me?"

I recall the sight of the dead grass plain, and the sound of rapid footsteps crackling upon it behind me. I remember turning around and seeing Dan running towards me. I remember being irritated by his presence... but why?

"I don't know. For some reason, I was angry that you were there. I wanted you to leave me alone, but I'm not sure why I suddenly felt that way."

Dan slowly pours a strange powder from the pouches into one of the vials. It glows bright crimson as it silently flows out, before disappearing into the transparent water. He eyes the powder carefully, before tilting up the pouch in preparation for another pour.

"Did you want to kill me?" he asks in a plain, objective tone.

"No, I didn't want to kill you. I just wanted you gone...at least, I hope that was the case."

A spurt of worry and guilt taps within me. I realize, too late, that it sounds like I actually wanted to kill him, just phrased differently. I try to explain my intentions more clearly.

"I can't imagine killing you."

Dan places the now empty pouch down onto the table. He lifts up the other pouch to the neck of the third vial, and begins to gingerly pour again. "I feel like you're withholding information from me... yet at the same time, you seem too openly clear, too sincere."

I nod slowly in agreement, trying to stay calm. Even just a suspicious facial expression could make me look worse. I really hope he trusts me.

Dan places the second pouch onto the table. He walks around the right side of the table, pulls a chair out from underneath it, and sits next to me. He is no more than a meter away.

Dan crosses his fingers neatly upon his lap. "Are you still nervous?"

I shake my head. The fear of death has subsided. The leeching fatigue of the enchanted armor, however, still remains.

"Can I see the book for a moment?"

I nod, reaching into my back pocket... but feel nothing in it. It feels so confusing and unexpected for the book to not be there... almost unnatural. At the same time, I feel an overwhelming sense of relief. And on top of all these feelings, there is a sudden sense of nervousness, pressed upon me by the draining magic of the armor. I despise this sense of nervousness; it reminds me of the consciousness of the book which tried to invade me. I try to ignore it, repress it, control it.

"Fristad? Fristad!" Dan's hand waves close to my face. "Can you hear what I'm saying?"

I focus on my vision, returning my attention to my surroundings. I nod at Dan.

"I asked if you could give me the book."

"Right. I would but... for some reason, I don't have it."

"Where is it, then?" Dan's brow furrows in suspicion.

"I'm sorry, but... I really don't know. I always keep it in my back pocket. Even when I set it down somewhere, it always appears in my back pocket again."

"And yet you don't have it with you right now, all of a sudden?" Dan glares at me, his eyes in a tight squint. After a moment's thought, his gaze drops, his eyes widening. "... but that doesn't make any sense, if the book really wanted to control you, then..."

"Perhaps it was trying to avoid your questioning?" I offer.

"Or perhaps..." Dan pauses for a moment. "... perhaps it confirms my suspicion that the book is indeed sentient."

"Sentient? As in... what? Self-aware?"

"Self-aware, yes. But it is a little more than that." Dan stands up and walks toward the shelves again. He reaches for two shallow wooden bowls. "It involves a certain form of mental connection to magic. Some spells work differently on sentient creatures than non-sentient ones, in the same way that some spells work differently on living things than inanimate objects." He sets down the two bowls on the table, then turns around toward the shelves again. "The ward protecting this room only works on sentient beings, and it seems that the book has been driven out by it." He collects some jars and pouches from the shelves and brings them back to the table. "That would only happen if the book was sentient."

I mull his words over for a bit. "But how do you know that the book was driven out? Perhaps something happened to the book since I last spoke with it." I feel the nervousness pressed upon me by the armor grow stronger, more difficult to ignore. The nervousness instills within me a strange longing, a parasite burrowing itself deeper into my mind. I despise it. I want it gone. "I can't help shake the feeling that the book is still able to control me somehow. I feel a power coming from the armor. It is almost as if the book exists within the armor itself."

Dan pauses from grinding material in a bowl with a pestle. "That complicates things..." He takes some powder from another jar, and pours a little bit into the bowl. "I'm still inclined to believe that the book is sentient, but I'm not sure what to make of the armor. Perhaps it is tied to the transformation..."

I nod. "I suspected the same."

Dan begins to pour a viscous, purple, slime-like substance from a jar into the other bowl. He begins to grind it with the pestle. "What does the power from the armor feel like?"

"Well..." I cautiously reflect on the mental influence of the armor, avoiding thinking too deeply about it, for the fear that obsession over it would cause its power over me to strengthen. "It makes me feel nervous and tense... not exactly afraid, though, like the ward made me feel. It feels almost like a parasite, feeding on my awareness. It's almost the same as the book made me feel... except the book made me feel a variety of other emotions as well."

"Interesting..." Dan picks up the two bowls and walks around the table. He holds the two bowls out in front of me. "I have a favor to ask of you. Please place one hand in each of the two bowls. Make sure your fingers are submerged in the powder."

I am confused for a moment, but I recognize that it's probably necessary in order for Dan to help me. I press my fingers into the powder of the two bowls. My right hand begins to tingle, then a strange burning sensation begins to pulse through it. "Ow!" I pull my hand out of the powder in pain. I glance at Dan. "Why'd you have to do that?!"

"Just a test." Dan pulls the two bowls away. "It actually gives me more reason to trust you."

I clasp and relax my hand, trying to get rid of the burning sensation. "I never thought skeletons could feel pain..."

"They can, indeed..." Dan grabs a few more pouches off the shelves. "...although the undead do tend to be affected by magic somewhat differently, which is why that test is useful." He begins to mix in more powders into the bowl which didn't make me feel pain. He then brings the bowl over to my side of the table. "I want you to put your fingers into the bowl again. Use your left hand this time. And don't worry; it won't hurt you."

I hesitantly place my left hand into the bowl and wait for a moment. I lose feeling within them, and they become immobile within the powder.

"What does it feel like?" asks Dan.

"It makes my fingers feel numb." I reply.

"I see..." He takes the bowl out from underneath my fingers. They remain stiff and numb, hanging from my bony wrist like a stiff sculpture.

Dan pours some of the powder from the bowl into each of the three vials on the brewing stand. Then he opens up a small pouch, and pours a small amount of grey powder into each one. The orange rod begins to glow, as black smoke materializes above the vials.

"What are those potions for?" I ask.

"They're for helping you sleep."

The nervousness impressed upon me by the armor grows in strength. The parasite within my mind pierces a barrier, beginning to chew at my willpower. I feel my perception of the foreign emotion turning; I feel the desire to accept it as my own. My ability to perceive its existence blurs; a growing desire within me urges me to leave the room immediately. Nervousness turns to fear. Dan is trying paralyze me. What if Dan tries to imprison me? What if Dan makes me drink that potion, and I never wake up? I have to escape.

I sprint from my chair onto the stairs, pushing myself up the steps as fast as my ebony legs will let me. I think I hear Dan yelling behind me, but I don't waste time trying to interpret what he says. I focus on continuing to ascend the steps.

Something bangs against my head. I hear the tinkling sound of breaking glass. A numbness spreads down my neck and towards my legs, making them stiffen. I fall forward onto the steps, but am unable to move. Blindness fades my sight to darkness. A fog of tiredness envelopes my mind, descending me into a deep sleep.

And within the ether of a waking dream, I hear a voice, soothing as spider silk. The voice fills me with happy but indescribable memories of a long lost friend. It is the Book.

"We meet again, at last..."


	28. Chapter 27: Peace and Darkness

I feel a gentle, warm breeze brush against my face. I open my eyes, and an incredibly blue sky blinds me with its brilliance. I place my hand up to my eyes to shield them from the bright blue light, letting them adjust more slowly. I turn my head to the right, and realize that I am laying down on a pastoral green field. Tiny flowers and puddles speckle the grass. Every so often, my eyes land upon one of several scattered trees, with lush and budding leaves and innumerable blossoms. Grazing cows are scattered across the landscape.

The whole scene seems familiar... I feel like I've been in this field before, except it was in the Summer, when the grass was golden and the sun unforgivingly hot. Yet this time around, freedom permeates the air. It is the place where I've always wanted to be, a place free from the darkness.

The savory smell of a pork roast persuades me to sit up and turn around. I see a cobblestone cottage with its chimney breathing smoke. The entrance is surrounded by a dense and colorful garden, with a mossy stone path leading up to an ornate yet sturdy wooden front door. The large stones holding up the walls have a deep and earthen texture, no doubt weathered by many storms. The wooden roof is slightly sagged, but its dark color suggests that it is as old as the stone beneath it, far too strong to simply break, but bound to slowly bend under its weight over many years.

The cottage reminds me of the safety and security of childhood, a period of blissful innocence and adventurous spirit, a time when the chaotic confusion of spawning for the first time was a close memory. Yet somehow, it isn't meant to last; the safety is only temporary. It is only a matter of time before the darkness finds me. I can only hide from it for so long.

I try to ignore the fear. It's not like thinking about it is going to make my troubles go away. It is inevitable. All I can do for now is enjoy however many days of peace I still have.

I turn my back away from the cottage and lay back down onto the grass, absorbing the tranquil Spring weather. My stomach rumbles, reminding me that I need to fill it soon. After many deep breaths, the sky darkens, an orange glow strengthens in the corner of my eye, and the cooling breeze tapers off. I think I hear someone calling my name.

I turn my head by stop halfway, seeing wisps of silver smoke snaking along the ground. The color of the world fades, the sunset reduced to an ominous white glow, the sky to black, and the grass to the color of ash. He is here. Why must he come too soon?

I swing my head forward as fast as I can. I don't dare look back. Any longer I stare into the smoke, the more it blinds me. And I'd surely be doomed if I looked into his eyes.

My heart pounds like a bashing brick. He has blocked my way to the cottage. If I try to run towards the cottage, he will surely catch me. However, if I try to run away from him, I will be distancing myself further and further from the safety of the cottage. Is there really much of a choice?

I have to run. As futile as it may be, it's my only hope of escape.

I rock forward onto my toes and push myself immediately into a sprint. I don't try to avoid the wet puddles which my steps splash onto my legs. I just stare into the grayscale horizon and focus on one thing: running.

I hear a malicious chuckle. "Do you honestly think you have any chance of escaping? Running is futile! Save your energy."

I feel my legs burning and my breaths growing heavier, but I don't let myself give in to the temptation of rest. Fear courses through every vein. I am running faster than I thought I ever could. My energy is the instinct of the primordial chase: I am the sheep. He is the wolf.

Another laugh. "When will you ever learn? I am catching up to you ever so slowly. With just a little more power, I could easily overtake you."

I say nothing. The world has become a numb illusion. The pain feels more distant. I feel my legs moving beneath me, but the movement has become automatic. Against my will, the frequency of my steps decreases ever so slowly, like the slowing flames of a furnace running out of fuel. For the love of Notch, don't slow down!

I focus on pressing my legs against the ground harder, swinging them forward with ever so slightly more force, hoping the exertion will push me forward ever so slightly faster. The contrast between the sky and the horizon begins to fade. A chill flows through me as I realize that it's too late to run. He has me.

All I see in front of me is grey, with wisps of silver smoke drawing in from the edges of my vision. I keep running in spite of seeing nothing, not willing to give up to the inevitable. Hot ethereal coils tighten around my ankles, pulling me into the air and dragging me backward. I am tipped over, forced down onto my knees against the grass I cannot see, and clamped in place by an invisible force.

"You see?" said the voice. "There's no point in running away. Someday, after disobeying me enough times, you will realize how wrong you were to even try."

I can't imagine what he will do to me... or what he will make me do. Still, there's nothing I can do to prevent it from happening. My muscles shake uncontrollably, to my frustration. Why must I appear so weak?

"What's that? Aww..." he coos. "It seems as if you're afraid!"

He tisks mockingly, in the same way a mother might to a disobedient child. His patronizing tone makes me enraged. I avoid the urge to clench my fists, to show any more emotion. It hurts to watch my ego burn.

He laughs yet again, longer and louder than before, savoring the moment. "What sickly delusion made you think that you, a mere human, could possibly trump my incredible power? Did you think you could outrun me? Outsmart me? Outfight me? Hm?" The invisible force pushes me closer to the ground. More laughing. "Do you want to know the cold truth? Well, perhaps, out of ignorance, you don't want to know. I will tell you anyway. The cold truth is that you are a lesser being: I own you! And it is only a matter of time before you are broken. You will come to respect me. You will come to serve me without question. And, of course, you will know better than to run away from your master!"

My hatred for him boils inside of me. I strain myself keep my mouth shut. Talking will only make things worse.

"So what are you planning to do? Resist? You know that path always leads to failure... so why bother? All resistance has brought you is pain and suffering, despite all the strain and effort you put into pursuing it! What kind of terrible life are you living? You could be happy... all you need to do is submit. I have incredible power... power that has been wasted making your life a Nether in the Overworld. I could use my power to bring bliss and meaning to your life! All you have to do is act as I say, speak how I ask you to, and think as I command! Is that really that hard? It's not as if my instructions are unclear. It's not as if what I'm asking you to do is life-threatening, or beyond what your puny human body is capable of! Why do you resist? You are taking the unnecessarily hard path! If you would just obey me, everything would be so, so easy..."

I feel a hand placed on my shoulder. It is deceptively warm. Behind that hand is a being that does not comfort, does not love, no matter how hard he tries to deceive me that it is so.

"So, what is it, then? What is preventing you from truly accepting me as your master?" His fingers tighten to a painful grip around my shoulder. "Tell me now!"

I shake my head. He will get no more knowledge out of me.

He sighs, unclenching his fingers from my shoulder and lifting his hand away. "It seems like we still have some work to do."

The ground rips open beneath me, and we are thrust into another space. I still see nothing.


	29. Chapter 28: The Mailman

I shriek compulsively as I rapidly sit up. The motion tosses a blanket off of me.

What a terrible nightmare.

I glance to my right and see Jonas laying awake, his violet eyes wide open and his elbows spread out in surprise.

"The blazes...?" Jonas croaks. I must have woken him up.

"Sorry about that," I apologize.

I feel an itch on my forehead and reach my hand up to scratch it. I realize, looking at my fingers, that they are no longer a mass of floating bones, but normal skin and flesh. So I didn't transform into a skeleton after all...

Thank Notch. I'm so glad it's all finally over.

"Did you have one of those nightmares?" Jonas asks.

I nod. "Yea. It was a pretty long one, too."

I turn myself around and tilt my weight off the bed and onto the floor. The walls are back to their dull, dark grey again, with glowstone light scattering dim yellow splotches onto them. I walk around the bed and sidestep through the half-open door. I see, on the other side of the hall, Dan's closed bedroom door. Perhaps he is inside.

I turn to my right and walk down the narrow hallway towards the stairs, picking up the pace. Nature calls.

* * *

As it turned out, I didn't get much sleep. It's early in the morning; the air is crisp and silent, and the sun barely peaks over the horizon. A few monsters are still lurking in the distance, mostly spiders, but none close enough to be a concern.

I walk back around to the front side of the shack and see Dan talking to somebody. His husky, Sunshine, is standing close beside him on his left. As I approach slightly closer, I recognize the gristly face of Greyfeld, the old mailman who used to come to my hometown of Veridale.

I grin and wave. "Grey! It's been a while."

Greyfeld turns his face towards me, his eyes widened in confusion. "Now, where do I recognize that voice from?"

I grasp my fingers around the base of my leather helmet and pull it off, allowing him to see my face.

Greyfeld nods his head in recognition. "Indeed it has."

Dan turns his cloaked face towards me. "You know this man?"

"Yea, he used to carry mail back in my town."

"...up until a couple years back." Greyfeld adds in his cracked voice. His eyes squint as he smiles. "How's it been, lad?"

"It's been fine. The livestock have stayed healthy. Thankfully there hasn't been plagues or raids, or anything of that sort..."

I feel a pang of fear as I stare at the helmet in my hands... loosely hanging there... insecure. I feel the cold morning air against my damp and newly bare head. An irresistible urge wills my arms to move mechanically, replacing and re-strapping the leather on my head in one fluid motion. Then comes a sense of relief. I try to recollect my jumbled thoughts, recalling the conversation that I started with Greyfeld.

"That's great to hear," Greyfeld turns back to Dan. "Is the price reasonable, from what you remember?"

Dan shrugs the shoulders beneath his grey cloak. "As reasonable as it gets in Bluesteel. You know how it is. Everything's expensive in the city."

"Ah." Greyfeld mutters in an exacerbated sigh. "That's not ideal."

"It's more ideal than the other alternatives. I remember there being some blacksmiths in Ash Valley that know how to make those sorts of things, but that's far too long a journey unless you travel by rail..."

"I don't want to leave my baby behind." Greyfeld shakes his head. He is referring to the swine steed that usually carries his deliveries in leather pouches. I notice the mail hog behind Greyfeld resting, its fleshy snout laying flat upon the gravel path. "I've heard the same from other folks as well. I suppose Bluesteel is the only reasonable option. Thank you for your advice."

"It is my pleasure. I wish you the best of luck and health."

"Thank you, Vrendan."

After those thoughtful words, Dan turns around and departs towards the shack. His husky trots alongside him, its closest forepaw nearly brushing against his heel.

"What do you need to buy at Bluesteel?" I ask Greyfeld, curious of why he needs to travel to such a large city.

"I need a back brace." Greyfeld answers frankly. "You wouldn't possibly know where I could find one, would you?"

I shake my head. "Not really."

"I didn't think so." A somewhat sorrowful look enters his eyes. "I went to see a doctor a few days ago, because I've been feeling really tired on the job. I started feeling that way several years back, when I used to travel over the Adamant Mountain pass..."

"So that's why you stopped coming to the other side of the valley." I reason.

"That's right," Greyfeld responds. "The tiredness became progressively worse, until I concluded it was no longer safe for me to travel across. Once I stopped going, the fatigue went away for a while, but then it started to get worse again. As it turns out, the doctor says there's something wrong with my back."

"That sounds terrible." Poor Greyfeld. He's probably been in a lot of pain, too. And yet he's kept delivering mail, all this time! "I hope you feel better once you get the back brace."

"I do too, lad. I do too." He smiles weakly. "Life's not as kind to those who spawned long ago. The pull of the earth isn't as forgiving to the bones of the old as it is to the bones of the young. But enough about me." Greyfeld waves his hand in a dismissive gesture. "What brings you out as far as Zomem, if you don't mind me asking?"

"I came here so Dan could enchant my armor." I pause for a moment, trying to remember something. "I think there was another reason as well, but it's escaped me for the moment."

Greyfeld's eyes scan from my head to my toe, then back up to my head again. "It is quite... I don't think I've seen armor quite like yours before. It looks similar to leather armor, except it's more... ornate."

A pool of anger wells up in my stomach. How dare he disrespect my beautiful armor! He has no idea what incredible passion and craftsmanship went into making it. My hands shudder slightly. I ought to crush him like I did to that skeleton...

I try to submerge the anger. I can't let my emotions get out of hand like this. I try to hide the signs of my inner anger, opening my hands and softening the clenching of my brow.

"Are you alright, Fristad? You seem a little out of it..."

"Don't worry; I'm fine." I reply.

Greyfeld nods, eyeing me carefully. "Is there something you want to talk about?"

"I'd rather not."

"Alright, then. I won't press you for information. To be honest, I'd rather not know the details of the business that brought you to such an infamous village as this."

"Infamous?" Now Greyfeld makes me curious. I had the impression that Zomem was impoverished, and I know that impoverished villages tend to attract crime, but what could possibly happen in Zomem to give it the title of infamous? "What do you mean?"

Greyfeld lets out a subtle and refined chuckle, the sort of sound that someone might make if they were very knowledgeable about something. "Where do I begin? Well, first of all, Zomem is a haven for dangerous fugitives, not the least halfbloods. You've probably seen at least a few of them by now."

"Well, you don't know if they're really that dangerous. The rumors can't possibly all be true." I restrain the urge to say more, remembering all too well the way the villagers treat Jonas back in Veridale.

"Perhaps some are exaggerated, but it's impossible for all the rumors to be false. You ought to know that halfbloods can't be trusted. They are monsters, after all. However, I won't press you further on the matter."

I feel a little sad. It's a shame that nice people like Greyfeld see halfbloods as monsters.

"Of course, there are other sorts of dangerous fugitives as well: thieves and bandits, naturally, as well as just about every breed of criminal that society has brought up. You name a crime, and chances are someone who lives in Zomem has committed it. Plus, Zomem's so filthy that disease is rampant. It's awful." Greyfeld shakes his head. "I don't mean to curse your visit, but it's something that's worth knowing."

"I didn't get the impression that Zomem was such a great place to begin with." I admit. "Thanks for telling me, I guess."

"I hope you heed that knowledge and leave quickly as soon as you get whatever business you have here over with. Also, there's one more thing I think you should know." Greyfeld's voice drops to a whisper. "It's about Vrendan."

I lean a little closer to make out his voice better.

"Vrendan is a dark magician. A practitioner of forbidden void magic. The worst of the worst."

"What's so bad about void magic?" I whisper.

"It is incredibly dangerous and powerful... to such an extent that it is said to be irresistible to avoid using it for one's own self-gain. It is said that void magicians can teleport as well as annihilate objects from existence. Some say that void magicians can even read minds. If I were you, I'd speak softly around Vrendan. You don't know what he'll do to you if you get on his bad side."

So Dan is a void magician. I contemplate the thought for a moment. "I'll try to be respectful around him. I mean, he seems like a polite guy..."

"His politeness is likely just his way of avoiding drawing attention to himself. He knows that what he's doing is illegal. People like him aren't without their hidden motives."

I nod. "I'll be careful."

Greyfeld backs away. "Please do, lad. It was great to speak with you again."

"You too." I reply. "I hope you feel better."

Greyfeld lifts himself onto his hog with a grunt, then kicks its belly with the side of his heel. The hog lifts itself from its bed of stones and begins carrying its master towards the rural side of town, where the poorly maintained cottages fade to grassland.


	30. Chapter 29: Mutually Sleep-Deprived

I think back upon Greyfeld's warning. What is void magic, really? And why is it illegal? I don't know all that much about the void. I've heard from some miners that there are holes leading to the void somewhere deep underground, hiding in the space between the lowest layers of bedrock. I've also heard that the void will annihilate anything it touches with the exception of bedrock itself... although according to Jonas and Dan, it seems that Endermen and obsidian are also immune to its destructive power. Exactly why it's so destructive, however, I have no idea.

I think back upon the first nightmare within the infinite library, where I had my intimate encounter with that all-destroying, malicious void. The pain of the void feels distinct from all other things; I retaliate in vengeful anger to the memory of its flame. It is hard quantify what I would be willing to give up to avoid feeling that pain again. How much more I would give up to forget the memory that it ever happened...

My hand wanders into my pocket, grasping the Book and opening it.

"It would be irresponsible for you to forget the memory of the void. That would be equivalent to forgetting evil in a search for moral truth. The memory of the void brings contrast to our goals. We seek greatness... power... prestige... but if we fail to find it, we are no better than fuel for the void's flames. That is not what you want, is it? Surely you want to avoid that terrible pain..."

The fear of the void begins to expand within me, but I repress it with a great struggle. You're trying to manipulate me, aren't you? You think you can use the threat of the void as an incentive to get me to do what you want... but you also won't go as far as to make me experience it again, because you can't stand the way it made you feel.

"That is far from the truth, I am afraid. I am far too familiar with the void to be bothered by tiny, miniscule snippets of memories such as the ones I show you in your dreams. Your definition of excruciating pain is quite foreign from my own... not that I would ever use that against you. Your future experience of the void, if it should ever happen, would not be of my own volition. Instead, it would be an inevitable consequence of your own guilt."

Fear turns to confusion. The sensation of trying to wade through my mind for the correct thoughts reminds me of the futility of trying to stay awake in bed with eyes closed, when dreams begin to flash incongruently in the mind with increasing strength, drowning out coherent thoughts.

Why would I ever feel guilty, unless you made me feel that way? You're just trying to hide the fact that you're trying to influence me. You want to catch me off guard by making me feel as if there is no threat to my own willpower, to make it easier to control me. You want to make it seem as if I'm in control, when I'm really not in control at all. But that's not what I mean by that. Wait, that doesn't make any sense, I...

Anger brews as I sift fruitlessly for ideas. It seems pointless to argue against the Book's congruent thoughts, its far superior logic seeming to make it unquestionably true.

"I think what you are trying to explain is the difference between free will and free judgment. You may have many conflicting thoughts of how to approach the future, some of which reflect your ideal desires. However, when it comes time to make a decision, there is only one obvious choice. Willpower is no more than the entertainment of impossible options."

What are you trying to say? That I don't have a choice?

"Hey there," Dan unknowingly cuts off our silent conversation. I put the book in my pocket and turn around, my eyes falling upon the cloaked magician carrying an empty basket filled with cloth. "Would you mind accompanying me to the market?"

I am abruptly returned to practical reality, the resentment of the argument with the book slowly fading away. "Um, no, not at all. I could use a walk." Especially after the mental weariness the Book made me feel.

We begin walking toward the gravel road. The Book projects a sense of annoyance. "You must give up this ridiculous delusion of yours that I'm trying to manipulate you. The fact of the matter is that it simply isn't true."

"Jeez, you just have to make it keep going," I accidentally verbalize my thought. Dan appears unphased, to my surprise, his blue eyes peering straight forward as if he never heard me.

After a few minutes of walking through the cool morning air, Dan breathes in, preparing to speak. "So, how did you sleep?"

"Alright, I guess. I woke up abruptly because I had a nightmare, but I don't feel all that tired now. How about you?"

Dan exposes a weak grin. "Eh, well... I actually didn't sleep."

"Why not?"

"I was kept up by magic."

With those few vague words, Dan makes me curious. I take advantage of the moment to try and test Greyfeld's suspicion that Dan is a void magician... and possibly understand what void magic really is. I settle on an obvious question at first, to avoid making Dan seem uneasy. "Why was magic keeping you up?"

"Well, it started off when I decided to help you enchant your armor. When I draw from my pool of magic to perform the enchantments, some of the excess lingers in my body, filling me with energy. Of course, the enchantment on its own wasn't enough to keep me awake; it was what came after." Dan glares at me with a cynical frown. "Next thing I know, you're undead, walking through the fields and shooting at the guards."

I become caught up in the sudden realization that the transformation actually happened, that what I experienced as a skeleton wasn't just a dream. "So I did transform into a skeleton after all..."

"Indeed you did, and you were quite the source of chaos. You could have hurt me if I wasn't as experienced at combat as I am."

I am torn between asking Dan about the magic he used to avoid my arrow and asking Dan about how I became human again. Chances are that Dan will mention the latter either way as he continues with the story of his night. I capitalize on the moment to ask Dan about the nature of his magic. "What was that purple vortex that came out of your hand to stop the arrow that I shot at you?"

"The technical term for it is a void rift," Dan answers without hesitation. "It does exactly what it sounds like it does. It opens a temporary rift into the void. Anything that flows into it is disintegrated."

A void rift could not be associated with anything else but void magic. The connection between the memory of my standoff with Dan last night and Greyfeld's words suddenly clicks. Dan can indeed annihilate objects from existence, just like Greyfeld said void magicians ought to be able to do. But does this mean that Dan can teleport as well... and perhaps even read my mind? I avoid that last thought, hoping that the privacy of my mind isn't invaded by more than one being at this very moment.

"So... void magic, basically?"

"Indeed." Dan adjusts the cloth in his basket. "That is one reason why I couldn't sleep, although the potion-making afterward was more significant."

I nod. "That's when you brewed that potion that made me human again."

"Well, no, actually. It's more complicated than that."

My jaw drops open in shock. "What do you mean you didn't change me back?" Is my human appearance just an illusion?

"All I did was give you a sleeping potion. It was the armor you are wearing that changed you back."

I trip over a pothole in the gravel path I didn't expect, but regain my footing before falling.

I feel a sense of relief, although Dan's specific knowledge about my armor strikes me as suspicious. Is it possible that he knew all along what the enchantment would do to me, but he refused to tell me about it? Is it possible that Dan read my mind in order to find out about my armor? But in that case, would he have known about my intention to kill the guards? And if so, why didn't he take the moral initiative to stop me sooner?

I have to ask him. "How did you know that the armor would change me back?"

Dan nods knowingly. "Therein lies the bulk of my sleep deprivation problem. When you came to me wanting to enchant your armor under the influence of the book, I didn't know what to make of it. When your enchantment turned out to be something I didn't recognize, I became very suspicious. That's when I used a large sum of magic to sift through my library for answers. As it turns out, you are not the first person to wear that enchanted armor; its effects have been documented. Once I found out that the armor could transform you into a skeleton, I figured the book had more immediate plans. The rest, of course, you already know."

We step onto the firm ground of the Zomem town square. The sun is now peeking over the horizon, dimly illuminating several townsfolk leaning against buildings and sitting on the fountain walls.

So Dan didn't really know about the enchantment beforehand. "I see now. But still, why did you let me enchant my armor in the first place, considering the influence the Book may have on me?"

"I simply didn't know what it would lead to. I can only act on knowledge I already have."

"I suppose you're right," I respond.

We enter the alleyway between two cobblestone buildings. The ground is a patchwork of stone bricks, trash, and dirt. As we approach closer, we get a closer view of a stone brick entryway with the door open. Beyond the door is a staircase leading underground. This must be the entrance to the market Dan mentioned, but what is with all these underground tunnels? A torch burns above the door, and on either side of the door there are wooden beams. On the beam on the right is nailed a painted sign:

Mothy's Market Manor

My lips burst open as I let out a spitting chuckle. "What kind of parent names their kid Mothy?"

Dan rolls his eyes. "When you see him, you'll understand. More importantly, however, try to be nice to him when you meet him. The townsfolk hardly give him any respect as it is."


	31. Chapter 30: Mothy

I follow behind Dan, as our steps create a damp echo within the descending stone passageway. We follow the stairs down as they spiral down at right angles, every so often illuminated by a lone torchlight which hangs within an indent in the wall.

Just as I spot a larger floor at the bottom of yet another final flight of stairs, I notice that my breath is a little heavier than usual.

By Jeb, if I feel even a little tired just walking down this massive flight of stairs, then all the more tired I'll feel walking back up it.

As my feet step upon the floor where the stairs end and a room begins, I mention this to Dan, slightly annoyed.

"That was one serious flight of stairs."

Dan nods. "I know. I can't say I'm too fond of the location, either."

I look around the room we have just entered, inspecting our surroundings. It seems that no one else is here.  
The room is long and narrow, its walls, floor, and ceiling all composed of stone. Display shelves take up the two side walls. The one on the left is tightly packed with baskets; one such basket is filled with potatoes, while another is filled with loaves of bread. The shelf on the right, closer to us, is more conservatively filled with books and papers, possibly records to keep track of store purchases. The back wall is barren stone, which strikes me as somewhat a waste of space.

About a meter away, there is an oak desk which partitions the shelf space from the entrance where we stand. Its surface contains many scratches and black stains, evidence that the desk has seen much use. On the oak desk sits a torch which dimly lights the room, an ink stand with a feather resting inside, and a piece of paper holding several words in black ink:

"Please wait for assistance."

I recall the sign posted at the entrance to the stairwell. So the shopkeeper's name is Mothy? What a weird name.

"Mothy isn't here..." I look at Dan in the eye with a hint of suspicion. "Are you sure we didn't come here too early?"

"Of course." Dan responds, placing the cloth-covered basket upon the oak desk. "The boy has always had early opening hours."

We stand waiting for a moment. The air is a deathly silence; our only close surroundings are the depths of stone.

I nearly jump as I hear a voice to my left. "Mr. Ti'Drannes? I wasn't expecting you."

As I turn to my left, my eyes fall upon a bizarre, humanoid creature. They are perhaps two heads shorter than me, with flaky silver skin, thick grey hair, black irises surrounded in grey, and a lopsided smirk. The creature wears a vest over a blue shirt and burlap pants. Their hands are thin, brown, and bony. I suspect the creature is a half-blood, but I don't recognize what monster the creature is related to.

The creature's grey eyes fall upon me. "I don't believe we've met before. My name is Mothy Cleftstone, and I am the owner of this f-fine establishment." Mothy's voice seems to tremble and stutter ever so slightly, and his inflection seems forced, as if the words do not come naturally to him.

"My name is Fristad. It's nice to meet you."

Mothy's grin balances out as it widens. "And you as well. It's always great to meet a new customer. How can I help you?"

"Well, um... I'm actually here with him." I pointed towards Dan.

Mothy lets out a long "Oooh" with an awkwardly high level of realization, as if he has discovered that the answer to an unsolved riddle is surprisingly obvious. "I see now. What can I get for you, Mr. Ti'Drannes?"

"I just need some more carrots, eggs, and bread." Dan responds.

"Certainly! Just let me g-get some eggs first. I left them in the back."

Somehow the way that Mothy phrases his plans sounds a bit odd for a room this size. I watch Mothy walk to the back, passing by each basket on the shelf without a single glance. Perhaps what he's looking for is near the very back of the shelf.

Mothy continues to walk forward until his body morphs to stone as he phases through the back wall. My jaw drops in surprise as Mothy disappears into the earth. "Wait, Mothy just... How did he do that?"

"He's part Silverfish," Dan replies. "He's well-attuned to the earth."

I try to wrap my head around Dan's explanation. I'm not quite sure what a Silverfish is, but the name sounds vaguely familiar. Still, what strange creature could walk through solid stone? Somehow it seems... wrong.

"What's a Silverfish?" I decide to ask.

"They're distant relatives of spiders, a meter long and half a meter thick all around. They live deep underground and near tall mountain ranges. Miners often disturb them when digging through the stone."

"So they live in the stone?"

Dan nods. His eyes have drifted away from me, looking at something behind me. I turn my head to see what it is.

A poster hangs against the wall, to the left of the stairwell. It appears to be some sort of recruitment poster for a mining union.

"Deep Shaft Mining Crew: Do you want to be a miner? Adventures and riches await you! Our crew explores the deepest caves and mines at magma levels. The danger is great and the reward is greater. Highest cut and best training are given to new recruits. Are you worthy? Visit our nearest mineshaft in Aridtown, and look for our seal."

To the right of the promotional passage is a blue banner with a pickaxe in the center, the foreground having an outline reminiscent of flames. Below the promotional passage is a heroic depiction of several miners in full diamond armor, holding their chins high and their diamond pickaxes aloft. Their artistically-depicted chiseled muscle is by no means an overestimation of a miner's strength, considering the miners that pass through Veridale. On the other hand, it's hard to imagine so many miners with diamond armor and tools, because of how rare diamond is. Plus, the miners in Veridale never carry diamond. They almost always carry iron, and the few that don't carry leather and stone.

As I hear footsteps coming from the stairs to the left of the poster, a brunette woman wearing a wool coat and carrying an empty basket steps down into the room. She walks forward to stand alongside me, waiting for the same shopkeeper that Dan and I came down to see.

We wait for about a minute. Mothy's stony form begins to stretch out from the wall, along with a strange mass of woven stone. As Mothy's flaked face returns to a lighter silver, the mass of stone comes to resemble a basket of eggs. The brunette meanwhile reaches into her coat pocket, pulling out a tiny pouch.

Mothy's head snaps toward the pouch with wide eyes. With visible effort, Mothy turns his head forward. He sprints to the desk and sets the basket on the table. "Amber, th-this really isn't a good..."

The brunette Amber tucks her finger underneath the string holding the pouch together, pulling the knot apart. She then tosses the pouch upon the floor, its hard, bead-like contents rolling out and bouncing along the floor. Mothy's posture takes on a feral crouch. His eyes glaze over as he lets out a slurping hiss. He dives onto his belly and rapidly claws at the beads, tossing them into his mouth. A harsh grinding sound causes my jaw to clench. Amber laughs hysterically at the ordeal. After all the beads are consumed, Mothy proceeds to roll over onto his back and lick and gnaw at his arms. As his sleeves are pushed back, I observe that his arms are thin and brown, just like his hands. Mothy then begins to rub and twist his arms together, as if applying a lotion.

I can't help but stare at him as he repeats the process... twice.

After starting to gnaw at his fingers for the fourth time, Mothy suddenly pauses, sanity returning to his widening eyes. "Nether..." He swears. He sits up and rocks back onto is feet. "Why did you have to do that?"

"Because I have a favor to ask of you." Amber replies, the smile of laughter now gone from her face. She reaches her hand into her coat pocket again and pulls out another pouch.

"Nonononono..." Mothy stutters, stepping back towards the desk. "Don't make me do that again."

Amber tugs at the knot of the pouch. "Then I want half price on groceries."

"What do you think this place is? I don't run a charity here."

"You WILL give me half price on groceries..." Amber insists, letting the pouch slip to the tips of her fingers, "... or you get to roll on the floor again like your slimy cousins."

Mothy lets out a deep sigh. "You know what? Fine." His eyes lock upon Amber. His face tightens into a scowl. "You can make me dance like a bug all you want... it doesn't matter anymore. I'm not giving you groceries for half price."

"Mothy, please..." A hint of desperation surfaces in Amber's voice. She looks at Mothy pleadingly. "I have a family. They're starving. We can hardly afford to feed ourselves."

"As if you're not the first person in Zomem to tell me that!" Mothy's voice rises in volume. "There are better ways to solving your food problems than p-putting it all on me. Besides, after all you've done to me, you don't deserve a discount."

"Look, Mothy... I have plenty more of these pouches, as you can see." She reaches her free hand into her coat pocket and brings out a handful of them briefly, before putting them back inside. "So, unless you want to be stuck in bug world for the next few hours, you'll give me the food that my family needs." Amber brings her hand back in preparation to throw the pouch.

"You know what? That's it! I've had enough!" Mothy slams his hand upon the desk. He reaches underneath the desk, and brings an iron sword out in front of him. "Either you pay f-full price for the food, or you leave with nothing."

"You'll drop that sword as soon as I throw this pouch..." Amber responds.

Mothy steps around the desk with the sword in hand. "You'll be s-sorry if you t-try to throw it."

"What, do you think you have the nerve to hit me? Nobody's going to buy from your shop any more if you start attacking your paying customers."

As much as I sympathize with Amber's family hunger, it seems wrong for Amber to humiliate and dehumanize Mothy in response. I decide to prevent her from throwing the pouch again. I reach for the sword at my belt... but find nothing. I clench my fist in frustration as I realize I forgot my sword again. I decide I can make my point just as clear by walking directly in front of her. By the time Amber and I have locked eyes, our chests are nearly touching.

I try to speak as firmly as possible. "Mothy's being serious. I think it's about time that you leave him alone."

Amber's eyes sink downward. A shade of pink leaves her face. "I suppose you're right."

She walks around me, reaches into another pocket, and sets coins upon the desk. She then pulls off the basket hanging on her arm, and sets it on the table next to the coins. "I'll take however many carrots and potatoes this money will buy."

I step back.

Mothy nods in acknowledgement. He brings her basket back to the shelf, placing carrots and potatoes inside of it. He then walks back to the desk. He takes the change before setting the basket down.

Amber picks up the basket, and carries it up the stairs without a word.

Mothy pulls a stool out from underneath the desk, sits down, and plants his face against the desk.

"I hate myself," he says in a muffled voice. "I always h-have to be the bad guy... on top of being this half-blood freak. Hardly anybody gives me respect..." He lifts his head up from the desk with his arm as he leans against it. "Someday I'll be a miner, and I won't have to make the choice of who gets to eat, and how much..."

"But if you're a miner, who's going to sell them the food?" I ask, perplexed.

"Oh, d-don't worry, there still will be plenty of merchants selling food throughout town. It's just that I have the lowest p-prices. It's the only way I can scrape by."

"Perhaps it might help for you to sell in a different location?" I suggest.

"Yea, but... it's not just the location; it's me. I can't stand being near the surface for too long."

I nod my head in acknowledgement.

Dan points on the poster on the wall. "I notice you have that poster up on the wall. Are you going to apply?"

"Sure am!" Mothy responds, a lightness returning to his voice. "I put the poster up as a reminder. I hope to gather up enough extra c-cash by the end of the month to afford the trip. With Stephen's blessing, I hope they see what I'm worth."

Mothy's hope makes me smile. A part of me even feels a little jealous. Here's this half-blood, working as a merchant and aspiring to be a miner, and here I am, a human, having worked as a shepherd my whole life, without a second thought.

"Mining is quite a demanding job, isn't it?" I ask.

"It is," Mothy replies, "but I know I can handle it." He turns to face Dan. "What can I get for you?"

"Could I have a loaf of bread, six eggs, and four carrots?" Dan requests, as he places his basket upon the desk.

"Will do!" Says Mothy, as he brings Dan's basket to the shelf on the left. He returns with the bread and the carrots beneath the cloth. He opens up the cloth again to place the six eggs inside.

"Hmm," Dan remarks as he reaches within his cloak. "I just remembered that one of my clients is late on their payment, so I guess I'll just take four eggs for now."

"Four eggs it is." Mothy puts two eggs back into the larger basket. "Sometimes I worry about you, Dan, with your p-profession and all. Some of the people you work with, I honestly hope they don't know I exist."

Dan chuckles. "I assure you that I don't pick clients just for the sake of making your life more difficult."

"Oh no, I don't mean it THAT way. I mean, I d-don't think most people would want some your clients to know that they exist, either. They're just those sorts of p-people..." Mothy glances at me for a moment. "... but I think I've said too much."

Dan hands Mothy the coins for the groceries.

"Thank you, Mr. Ti'Drannes."

Dan smiles. "Thank you for the food. I'll be seeing you."

As Dan turns around, I take the queue to walk towards the stairs.

"Also, mister-what's-his-name. Tristam, was it?"

I turn around towards Mothy. "Fristad."

"Right, of course. Fristad!" Mothy spreads his hands in annoyance of forgetting. "Thanks for sticking up for me when that girl was here. That really meant a lot to me."

"No problem."

As I start to ascend the stairs again in earnest, the Book's presence enters my mind. Its female voice fills my thoughts.

"I have a feeling that getting to know that man could be of benefit to us. If he does end up becoming a miner, he will have access to quite valuable resources. Even if he doesn't, I think there is a lot to learn from him."

For once, I think I actually agree with you. Well, at least partially.

Yet a small part of me is hesitant, for a reason that I cannot retrieve.


	32. Chapter 31: A Common Problem

"Speak of Herobrine..." Dan remarks, ending the silence of our walk.

Leaning against Dan's cobblestone shack is a tall, scarred, tanned man. His bald, tattooed head is ribbed from the pressure of his scowl, the lips beneath it pierced with three gold rings. From the neck down, chainmail dirtied with red and green stains covers his body. Across his chest run two diagonal leather straps, holding a bow and quiver in place against his back. At his waist are strapped two scabbards: one iron, one gold.

The man's shrewd eyes inspect a pale red crystal turning over in his hand. It takes a moment for the man to notice us before he lifts his eyes from his study. The bulge of his brow gives his gaze a threatening undertone, but it does little to hide his slight uneasiness.

"I have bad news," The bald man begins to say, his voice deep and hoarse, worn and deepened from unknown trials worth reckoning with.

"That's not exactly the best way to introduce yourself after your friend was late on his payment," Dan responds, unamused, a hint of anger creeping into his voice.

The bald man shakes his head. "There's no other way to put it. There have been delays. There's been a..."

"I don't want to hear excuses." Dan snaps off the man's sentence. He walks out in front of me, then stops near the door of the shack, about two meters away from the man. There is hesitation in his demeanor for a moment, then the frame of his body relaxes a little. "I want an explanation of how your friend is going to pay me."

"He wanted me to tell you that the payment you desire is on its way. However, he also wanted to make it clear that it is a privilege to do business with him," The man replies, seemingly emboldened by Dan's concession to compromise. "He said that your deal with him is conditional upon your cooperation."

"Is that supposed to be a threat?" A calm and deliberate confidence returns to Dan's voice. "Because it certainly won't change the deal we've already made. I don't take threats for a bargain. He's late on his payment, and I want compensation."

"Fine. What do you want?"

"That sword," Dan points at the bald man's golden scabbard.

The man pauses for a moment, confused, his stare questioning if Dan is actually being serious. A flash of worry ripples across his brow, and then he nods, fidgeting with the belt until he unclips the scabbard from his waist. He hands the covered blade to Dan, handle first. "Collateral?" the man asks.

"No, interest." Dan takes the sword from the bald man, who lets go of it reluctantly. "There is collateral, though, and you can probably guess what that might be. Let your friend know that." Dan pauses a moment to let the meaning sink in. "When can I expect payment?"

"Within two to three weeks," the man's dark brown eyes lock upon mine, his scarred and tight-muscled face causing me to feel uneasy. "We also need assurance that the man over there will keep quiet."

Dan follows the man's line of sight until his vivid blue eyes fall upon my own.

"I won't say a thing; just don't get me involved," I reply.

"It's a deal, then." Dan turns back to face the man. "However, there won't be any leeway this time. I've been too forgiving already, simply because I'd rather resolve this issue peacefully while I'm in front of a guest."

The man nods. "Your urgency will be made understood." He pushes his back off of the wall and begins to walk towards the neglected gravel road.

Dan turns the golden sheath over, squinting at its vine-engraved design critically. He tilts it forward while slowly pulling out the handle from the upper end, the friction creating the tinny sound of gliding metal. Muted yellow sunlight travels down the length of the blade, sometimes amplified to a burning brightness with the pulse of a purple sheen.

He lifts the blade upward, then slowly rotates it back and forth. On either side of the blade is a geometric, crisscrossing design, its shapes resembling the exposed layers of sediment in a high cliffside. "What a shame," Dan mutters. "Even with the enchantments I've added, this sword is worth more melted down than kept as a weapon. The gold from it is worth a lot, though, which is what matters in the end..."

It seems somewhat strange that such a tough-looking man would be willing to accept a deal with Dan so quickly. Why would he give up his own sword, when he could have insisted that his friend pay the interest? The man looked as if he had seen many battles, not the sort of man who would give up one of his own possessions to avoid confrontation.

Dan pushes the blade back into its sheath, its entry ending with a metallic click. "I'll have to travel to Bluesteel to sell this for a good price. You may have to come with me."

"Why is that?" I ask, somewhat confused of why I'd have to tag along.

Dan looks at me, perplexed. "Don't you remember back in Mothy's shop, when I couldn't purchase the eggs I wanted? That man's friend..." Dan points towards the gravel road behind me. "... has been so late on his payment that I'm running out of money for food."

I can't help but draw a parallel between Dan's client and the customer that visited Mothy this morning. "You're not the only one having trouble getting paid, are you?"

Dan reveals a little smirk. "Lack of money is a common problem in Zomem." He turns around and opens the door. I begin to walk towards the entrance.

"It sure seems like it..."

Zomem seems to be a magnet for misfortune, from poverty to crime to disease. It's not exactly the best place to make a living. Still, its population is so isolated and desperate that it is the perfect place to begin germinating my power. If I go to Bluesteel with Dan, I lose that opportunity to begin my plans. Bluesteel is far too heavily populated, far too fortunate with resources, for me to be able to control it.

I close the door behind me, leaving only the flickering torchlight to illuminate our faces. Why should I think that way? Since when did power matter so much to me? I'm not like this.

My thoughts change shape. I feel as if my head has been dunked in water. The memory of last night materializes. I see the fallen guard at my feet, laying limp upon the dried grass. What if he wasn't actually dead? What if he was just laying there, because I told him to? What degree of loyalty would that take? In a rural town like this, he'll have few places to turn... and if Dan is gone, nobody will be able to stop me.

We begin to walk down the stairs. I resolve to convince Dan to let me stay. "Still, that doesn't explain why I have to come to Bluesteel with you."

"I'm afraid that if that book's control over you isn't severed in the next few days - and frankly, I highly doubt it will be that easy - then I have no choice but to bring you with me." A meter across the library at the bottom of the stairs, Dan stops and turns around. "Your compromised willpower makes you a danger to society... as well as yourself."

I stop after taking the last step down. "Is there any way that I can stay here?"

"No. I need money for food. Why must you insist?"

The Book speaks. "It's not working. If you try to press your demands upon Dan at this point, he will only trust you less. Bide your time."

I sigh in defeat. Since when was the Book the reasonable one, restraining the demands of the other mind-kin?

"I don't know," I respond to Dan, searching for a harmless excuse for my behavior. "I guess I'm just tired from the long trip yesterday."

Dan nods and smiles, seemingly accepting of my explanation. "You've had to endure a lot since your troubles with the book started. I recognize that. Don't worry; I still have a few days worth of food, before the trip will be necessary."

I work to conceal a glare with a sorrowful smile. Poor Dan. He's still naive enough to think that I want to get rid of the Book. He still thinks that my friend is solely a nuisance. The longer he's kept in the dark, the better.

"It seems that Dan does not suspect your motives," says the Book. "That is exactly what you need. I apologize from restraining you from your desires. Usually, you are the reasonable one."

It would cause me too much guilt to pretend that. On the contrary, I've been the demanding one. I greedily drew on your power to craft the armor, then insisted that Jonas bring me to Zomem to enchant it, ignoring the warnings you gave me. I insisted on staying here, when you knew it would be impossible. I should have known sooner that you were the reasonable one. I should have known that you were the one keeping me sane.

Dan lifts the cloth-covered basket, the motion in my line of sight helping me to climb out of the haze. "Do you mind joining me to make some eggs?"


	33. Chapter 32: Uncertain Memories

After breakfast is prepared, the three of us sit down at the kitchen table. Dan pinches the fabric of his cloak, pulling it backward onto his chair, revealing a collared shirt. Even without the cloak, there is a less friendly edge to his appearance. A weighted tiredness pulls on the lids of his eyes. Jonas begins to eat first, his hood obscuring his line of sight as his head is bent down.

I look down at the food in front of me. There is a glass of water, two eggs, a slice of bread, and a piece of melon, courtesy of Jonas.

A few minutes pass in silence, aside from the chewing of food. Dan looks up at me, the smoothness of the small motion conveying a sense of volition and purpose.

"I recall you telling me that you had a nightmare last night," Dan remarks.

I nod, recalling the chase with dread. It seems as if the dreams are only getting more vivid and coherent. The thought of running through the endless grey persists in my mind, kindling a fear which tenses my muscles, despite my logical belief that the threat isn't real. I want to run away. I want it to disappear.

"It must have been a bad one," Jonas adds, his purple eyes observing me with concern. "You don't look good at all."

"You really do not," Dan adds. "Perhaps you should talk to us about it. At the very least, it could make you feel better."

"I suppose I could..." My speech comes slowly, bogged down by the worry that my words could carry to unwanted ears. But whose ears? It doesn't matter; there is no good reason for me to feel this way. Maybe if I talk about the dream, and describe the feeling, I could finally convince myself that it isn't real.

"The dream began at a peaceful cottage in the spring. The air was warm, and there were many flowers. I remember laying down upon the grass, trying to ignore the feeling that something was searching for me, something very dark..." I pause for a moment, feeling the anticipation soak in. It's no use trying to wait for it to pass. "The sun started to set, and then I heard someone calling me. I think it was my mother."

It's been a very long time since I've seen my mother. Perhaps that was one reason the nightmare effected me so deeply: there was the knowledge that regardless of what I did, I might never see my mother again. Still, I'll never know for sure if it was her. The voice was so faint.

"I tried to turn around towards the cottage, but I stopped because I saw silver smoke on the grass. It made me afraid to look behind me. I thought there was someone there that would trap me if I looked into his eyes."

Dan nods in acknowledgement. His eyes appear more open and alert.

"I tried to run away from him, but the longer I ran, the more silver smoke there was. He kept calling after me, telling me that running was useless. I kept running, but I started to get tired. I felt myself go blind. I was pulled off my feet by hot coils and clamped in place. He gloated over me, claiming that he could do terrible things to me, telling me that I would become his unconditional servant. Then I felt the ground give way underneath me. That's when the dream ended."

Both Dan and Jonas are looking down, deep in thought. Their reaction doesn't seem like enough. I didn't describe the nightmare well enough, did I? I couldn't adequately describe the events which made me so afraid. I don't think I ever could; somehow the true detail of the events is hidden from me. They can't sympathize with me, no matter how hard they try.

"This man..." Jonas speaks first, "...seems very controlling, not unlike the book."

"That's no surprise, considering that the Book created the dream." I remark.

Dan raises his head. "I wouldn't be so sure. It might be a memory from someone that got trapped in the void, perhaps the memory of a miner."

"So, does that mean that, while the Book was passing through the void, it may have heard the thoughts of a miner?" An idea inside me clicks, a realization that excites me. "Or... perhaps the book actually is the miner, and all this time I've been hearing their thoughts?"

"Not quite," Jonas corrects me. "'Thoughts' are not the best way to describe the sorts of fleeting impressions that drift through the void. When a human consciousness enters the void, the void has the tendency to tear it up into tiny pieces. They become more or less dead; they aren't capable of new thoughts or ideas. The book would have come across one of the miner's memories, at the very most."

"I see..." My sigh echoes my deflated hopes at an explanation of the Book's existence. On the other hand, the existence of fragmented memories within the void may explain where the terrible nightmare came from. This possibility, however, does not get rid of the fear that I feel. "Still, who was that man who was chasing me?"

"It's hard to say," Dan responds, "especially since you couldn't see his face. Do you remember him having a name, or perhaps you remember what his voice sounded like?"

"No."

Jonas resumes eating, his hood covering his eyes once more.

"In that case, it's unlikely that we will ever know who the man was," Dan admits, his brows lifted in sympathy of the mystery. "He might not even be a real person, depending on how much of the dream came from a memory, and how much was, in fact, made up."

I suppose it can't be helped that I may never know who that man is, but I still feel a bit disappointed. When Dan mentioned that the nightmare could have come from the memory of a miner, the possibility gave me hope. It made me feel as if I could have knowledge over the Book, a psychological power of identity that would allow me to struggle against it.

A force within me tugs down upon my defenses. The female voice of the Book coos in my inner ear. "Why struggle? There is no point in trying to explain my existence, when your failure only sheds yet a bigger spotlight upon your human flaws. In fact, it is pointless for you to struggle at all, because you have already become so weak and agreeable that you think and act as I will you to. It is only a matter of time before you anticipate my desires without my intervention, and from then, only a matter of time until my desires truly become your own."

With the weight of all my hopelessness, my ability to struggle against the nightmare collapses. The fear of the nightmare becomes real and inescapable. The Book is just like the man in the dream; it points at the inherent failure of my struggle, promising that I will become its slave. I am doomed to be naive of the Book's methods... but perhaps I may at least know its motives. It will likely do me no good - the knowledge of its plans will make me only more aware of its superior genius - but I can at least seek out the knowledge as an exercise in futility.

"What would motivate the Book to make me have that nightmare?" I wonder aloud.

Dan pushes his chair back, stands up, and lifts his plate. "I think that if I am going to make any progress with reducing the book's influence on you, that is one of the questions that will need to be answered."

At this point, I doubt that reducing the Book's influence is even possible. On the other hand, Dan seems so certain of his proposition... What could he possibly know that would help me?

I pick up my plate and follow Dan to the sink. That wasn't the only dream I had last night, was it? There was another, more peculiar dream. It wasn't exactly a nightmare, but it seemed to be a continuation of another, much more frightening dream, a dream where I fell into the void and felt its flames. The dream began in a library. There was a very old book that mentioned the WOC.

Dan sets his plate upon the counter, then starts to pump the wooden lever of the sink.

"I had another dream last night," I add.

A tiny stream of water begins to flow out from the faucet in spurts. I can hear the water's dripping echo as it enters the tub. "What sort of dream?" he asks.

"I'm not sure. I thought it was going to be a nightmare, but nothing happened. Well, at least, nothing scary happened. I was in a library, walking around, when I found an old book. It talked about crafting and the WOC. On the blank pages, a magician had written some harsh criticisms about the WOC. I'm not sure whether or not they're true... What do you know about the WOC?"

Dan is thoroughly scrubbing his plate with a yellow sponge. A firmness arrives to his jaw. "A bunch of pig-kissing scum, the lot of them," He replies, a sarcastic joy tapering off from his tone. "They'll yield to any politician that shakes their hand. But then again, I'm probably not the best person to ask." He sets his plate aside and steps away from the sink.

I submerge my plate into the tub of warm water and take the sponge from Dan. "What do you mean? What is it about the WOC and politics?"

"They try too hard to maintain their public image. If given a choice between supporting a radical new technology, and maintaining the status quo, they will always go with the latter."

I continue scrubbing. Dan's description sounds familiar. "It's interesting that you mention that. I remember the magician writing something similar about how the WOC is afraid of progress."

"Well, that isn't quite right. It's not that the WOC is afraid of progress in itself. I doubt the WOC would have any issue with, say, another dye for wool, or a new redstone gate. What they're more afraid of are altogether new technologies, especially if they clash significantly with cultural norms. The WOC was worried about enchantment, not too long ago. They feared that there would be no way to know how many enchantments exist, and that rare, powerful ones could be used to terrorize society."

I place my plate on top of Dan's, then step away from the sink, handing the sponge to Jonas. The WOC is probably the reason why void magic is illegal. That may explain why Dan despises them so much. "It seems like the WOC wouldn't think too favorably of magicians like you."

"No, most certainly not."

"Has the WOC ever tried to hunt you down?"

"Hunt me down?" Dan reacts with surprise. "No... I don't see how the WOC could do that. They don't have that kind of power."

"That's strange. I remember the magician saying something about how the WOC was waiting at his doorstep."

"I'm not sure why that is so."

Jonas places his clean plate upon our stack of plates. I start picking up the silverware.

"Perhaps it was just a dream, then," I reason, "or perhaps the magician was just crazy."


	34. Chapter 33: Qualia

"I'm afraid you aren't going like what's about to happen," Dan admits, sitting upon a stool, his hand resting upon a large, leather-bound tome. The sole word "Qualia" is engraved into its binding.

We are back at the bottom of the great obsidian room. This time, Dan has halted the influence of the ward on the Book as well. I can feel its pressure within my back pocket. On the tables, most of the brewing stands are filled with vials of variably colored fluids, emanating grey smoke.

"Will 'what's about to happen' involve ingesting various forms of potentially hazardous liquids?" I ask, still wary of the substances I encountered the last time Dan brought me here.

"Potentially hazardous? No. Some will taste quite bitter, though."

"Oh, joy..." I try not to think of what the various forms of potentially disgusting liquids will taste like. "I can't wait."

"Neither can I," Dan adds with a reserved smirk. He gazes blankly for a moment in thought, then stands up from his stool, and walks toward the left wall. He picks up a steaming vial gingerly from its rim; the liquid dancing in the glass is a dark, opaque purple. He tilts the vial in a circular motion to cool it off, then, to my surprise, lifts it to his own mouth to drink, pinching his nose as he capsizes the vial.

Dan then hovers the vial above the brewing table, but drops it prematurely as he lets out a sickly grunt. He clasps his hands upon his face, the intensity of his grimace on the border of disgust and pain. His back is hunched now. Is he choking?

"Are you alright?" I cry out, standing up from my stool.

Dan waves his hand slowly in dismissal. "I'm fine, ahh..." His hands migrate to the silver hair under his hood and clench at the scalp. "It will pass. None of your potions are quite as vile, I assure..." Dan lets out a groan of pain. With effort, he braces his weight against the table. He tilts his head in a futile attempt to escape the pain.

After a moment of bracing and heavy breathing, Dan sighs in resistance, and stands up silently. He sets the fallen vial upright, picks up another potion by its rim, and walks back to the center table. He tilts the potion in a circular motion, places the potion in front of me, then returns to his stool. This potion contains a transparent, teal liquid.

"What just happened?" I ask, concerned for Dan but also nervous of what the potion will do to me.

Dan turns open the tome and flips through its pages, his eyes flitting from one side to another. "I ingested that potion to increase my magic pool. The spells I intend to cast are quite costly."

"I thought you said that the potions aren't hazardous."

"I was referring to your potions, not mine," Dan clarifies, as his fingers trace the tiny text. He glances up at me for a moment before bending his head over the tome again, flipping through its pages. "Please drink it at once. The effects of my potion won't last long, and I will need the effects of both potions in order to cast this spell."

I behold the potion one last time, wary of what effects hide within the teal liquid, before lifting it to my lips. It is quite bitter, but far more bearable than I had anticipated. I feel the warm liquid sink down my throat and into my stomach. As I monitor its presence, I hope to Notch that whatever magical ingredients now inside of me do not cause intense pain. As the seconds pass, I feel nothing unusual. I wonder what Dan was trying to warn me about.

"Why do you say that I won't like what's about to happen?"

I watch Dan settle upon one thin slice of the thick brick of pages. He neatly moves it to the side and begins to read.

"It's the spell, isn't it?"

"The spell is also harmless," Dan states vaguely. "At least, it is harmless in and of itself. They all are. However, some of the experiences that the spells create could provoke an emotional response. They could be extremely sad, unpleasant, or possibly even terrifying. It's hard to say how you will react, mentally and physically."

"Physically?" Now I wonder if the pain I've anticipated is not so far off after all.

"Well, you may act out in response to what you see. I don't have time to go into any more details, though. The bottom line is that I am trying to provoke the book, in order to understand its motivation. Now, let us begin..." Dan clears his throat with a raspy exhale.

"You're going to try to provoke the Book?" My heart begins to speed up, as Dan's magical dialect begins to echo in my ears. I feel like he's ignoring me. "You better know what you're doing. I've had too many bad experiences with the Book already."

The spell continues without pause. Dan's brows are locked in concentration.

My arm reaches behind my back and brings the Book in front of me; its open page is filled with script as the two competing voices in my head cancel in interference. "How dare you treat me as a mere inconvenience! It is a disgrace when compared to the level of trust that we have placed in one other. You know without a doubt that I have done so much to help you. The least you could do is be grateful, rather than make up stories about all these 'bad experiences' you've never had."

The guilt of my denial becomes clear and painful. The worst part is that the Book is right about all of it.

Just as Dan's voice begins to strengthen in my ears, and between the moments where the words on the page have faded and new words are written to replace them, my vision begins to spin and flash. A sound like a stormy wind deafens me, and I am thrust into empty space.

-

I am back at my house, standing in the foyer. I am happy to be home, and relieved to be finished after a long day at the corral with Jonas. The dry warmth of the faintly oak-smelling air is the perfect luxury after running through the cold, autumn air. I walk towards the side room, relishing every step, in preparation to rest in one of the chairs.

My muscles sink in relief as I sit down. I have the weak feeling that there should be something in my back pocket, but when I reach inside of it, I feel nothing but the burlap fabric. I recall that whatever used to be in my back pocket represented some business I needed to attend to. Now that it's gone, the business it represented must have been taken care of.

I sigh as I look back upon my day. Somehow the details seem fuzzy, but I feel especially comfortable right now. I absorb the familiarity of my surroundings. In front of me is a small, square table with four chairs, all made of oak wood. One of these chairs, the closest to the foyer, I am sitting in. In my line of sight is a torch upon the table, followed by a chair, and beyond that a shelf, containing many month's worth of almanacs, various nonfiction books, and kitchen supplies. Below the shelves are closed drawers. To my right is a window, through which the lit windows of other homes can be seen. To my left is a sink, a stone counter, and a furnace.

I begin to consider plans for the rest of the night, thoughts which also seem fuzzy. I wonder why my thoughts are so disconnected, until I realize that this world does not exist. My body tumbles into a silver atmosphere, every part of me submerged in an unbearable heat; the world itself seems to burn around me, every perception and memory fuel for the flame. Then, the void, like my home, ceases to exist.

-

My senses emerge from blindness into Dan's great room. The Book projects giddy relief.

"Fristad, I thought that I had lost you. I returned to the void, exposed to its all-consuming acid. I thought I would be trapped there forever. Thank Notch that it is not so."

I feel shock at the prospect of sharing my mind with the Book once more, longing for the solace of being alone at home. However, I suppress this idea, preferring to give it up than succumb to the Book's vindictive guilt. I pretend to be happy to see the Book again.

"What did you experience?" Dan asks, ending my train of thought.

"I was at my house. I went and sat in the chair. At the very end, I was burning in that Notch-forsaken void," I articulate the last word, 'void,' with difficulty. It now has an added weight on my tongue.

"Hmm..." Dan contemplates for a second. "That is a relatively predictable response. Let's move on, then."

"Wait, that's it? I just felt the effects of incredibly painful, soul-shredding flames, and you say we're going to move on? Don't you think excruciating pain like that is noteworthy?"

"Given the fact that the book has likely spent thousands of years in the void, no."

-

The process is repeated many times. Dan and I each drink a potion, and then Dan recites a spell. Unlike the first spell, the following experiences are consistent between the Book and I. We experience nature in its many forms, from forests and deserts to caves and oceans. Then, we are thrust into a variety of other worlds, from a cavern of lava and scarlet stone, whose heat makes me certain that it is the Nether, to an island of sandy clouds, to an ether of red shadows, to yet other things that I am incapable of describing. None of the environments seem to incite an emotional response in either of us, although they are all quite beautiful.

I drink another potion. This time, it is a milky white. Since the first potion, Dan has consistently drunk a translucent orange potion, without suffering any visible signs of pain. He drinks the same potion now.

Once again, Dan recites a spell, his voice reverberating off of unseen walls of magical energy. I wait as my senses fail me, plunging me into another world.

-

Immediately, I feel a sense of uneasiness. It is cold and dark. As my eyes adjust, I observe that I am surrounded by a dense crowd of trees. It is completely silent. The moonlight rests faintly on the grass like a ghost.

I am dressed lightly for the weather and the circumstance. I wear only a shirt, pants, and shoes. There is no satchel hanging from my shoulder, no sword hanging from my waist, and no armor to protect me from the monsters that could be hiding behind any one of the nearby trees. They could ambush me at any moment.

I listen carefully for any sound of movement, wary that rushing to escape will only make me an easy target.

For a while, there is nothing but silence. Then I feel my shoulders jump as a twig snaps behind me. I crane my neck around.

Please let it be a stray chicken. I strain my neck to keep an eye on all the gaps between the trees where the sound may have come from. My heart jumps as I hear loud footsteps in front of me. I swing my neck around and lock eyes with a creeper, two meters away. It is even more terrifying in the dim black and white. Its permanent scowl mirrors the tragedy of my fate. Its beady eyes barely shine in the moonlight. It is too late to escape. I hear it begin to hiss.

Then the illusion ends, only to be replaced by another. I am in a dimly lit library. Facing me is a man in a full body cloak, not just any man, but one capable of great magical power. I try to focus on his face, but it is fleeting and blurred, like an incomplete memory. Somehow the magician terrifies me even more than the creeper. I am afraid of not just the abrupt end of my life, but a fate worse than death.

-

Finally, that frightening illusion ends as well. Dan appears in my vision once more. He seems to be worried, aware that this illusion was different from the others.

"What did you experience this time?" Dan asks with a tone of sincerity.

"I was standing in a dense forest, where I was ambushed by a creeper. Afterwards, I saw a magician in a library."

"A magician?" Dan raises an eyebrow. "What did they look like?"

"I didn't see much. All I saw was that the magician was wearing a long, hooded robe, but..."

As I look into Dan's eyes, I notice something distinct about him, the same distinct feeling that I experienced in the presence of the magician in the illusion.

"...I could almost swear that the magician I saw was you."

At those words, Dan's face turns pale.


	35. Chapter 34: Nobody's on Trial Here

What was that feeling I felt, in that short illusion? The distinct feeling ricocheted into my memories as if I had never experienced it to begin with; somehow the memory continued to construct itself after the illusion had ended, before being covered under the fog of the past.

I subject the memory to a cognitive interrogation. Why was it that the distinct feeling made me so afraid? What was I afraid of? Where did the feeling come from? How did I become aware of that distinct feeling in the first place?

The confusing barrier, which prevents me from satisfying that last question, was the feeling's lack of a connection to any distinct physical sense or any concrete thought. The distinct feeling was a solitary idea, an emotion without a purpose. It could have been, according to the title of Dan's spellbook, a qualia. Perhaps that is why I was afraid?

That still doesn't explain why I briefly felt that same feeling when I began looking into Dan's eyes.

Dan's face has recovered from a white paste to his unusually-pale-yet-healthy complexion. He leans forward over the table as if to say something, his extended palms held flat upon the wood surface as his wrists bend his draped arms upward. His blue eyes cast a silver sheen which travels from one iris to another. I am struck with the suspicion that he is peering deep inside of me, a terrible guilt that he is sifting for sins which I have tried so hard to keep secret. It is a just punishment for my terrible ways. As he breaks eye contact, I feel my shoulders slump down a little in relief. An ignored knot in my neck subsides.

Dan's brows slump in confusion and intrigue for a moment, before they are nullified by Dan's neutral, skeptical tone. "What makes you so sure that the magician you saw was me?"

I doubt myself as I recall the lack of clarity in the magician's face, the contrast of the firm knowledge of seeing the eyes, nose, and mouth, with the lack of knowledge about their appearance. Still, it's difficult to disregard that distinct feeling that I felt, looking at Dan, at that one moment. "Somehow, when I looked into your eyes, I felt the same sensation that I did when I looked at that magician in the illusion. It's difficult to explain the feeling. I suppose you'd call it a qualia."

Dan leans back again. "A quale, you mean?" He briefly shakes his head. "I'm not so certain that a quale alone could explain the connection between the magician in your vision and I. It's just... too specific."

"What do you mean?"

"A single quale would not be enough identify me. Qualia aren't even thoughts, but empty molds upon which thoughts may grow. I especially can't find any reason why the quale that I induced would be connected to me."

"Why not? What was it?"

"It was the quale of fear."

I feel the temperature of my face drop a few degrees as well. "That doesn't make any sense. Why would I be afraid of you? I've just met you."

"You're right; it doesn't make sense. The only good explanation would be that the book was responsible. Exactly where that line of reasoning leads, I don't know, but every possible turn seems foul..." Dan stands up from his stool. His lips stretch in a slight grin. "Of course, that's assuming that the magician you saw in the dream was me, which I highly doubt."

The Book's voice rises up again. I feel its restrained suspicion. "It seems that Dan is hiding something from us. Don't you find it odd whenever Dan smiles like that? That same grin was on his face when he offered to enchant the armor for you, and yet again when he said that he didn't get any sleep last night."

That's unusual. I don't think I've ever heard the Book utter words so specific. I contemplate those events for a moment. I suppose it is a bit strange that Dan would smile in those situations. At the same time, perhaps he simply enjoys talking about magic. Actually, now that I think about it, Dan could have easily smiled before the enchantment as a matter of benevolence... but that's not the only reason he smiled, was it?

I remember that moment in the enchantment room, right after Dan put an arm on my shoulder, at the very moment that I turned around. There was a silver glint in his eyes, wasn't there? That same silver glint made me feel that same burning, condemning guilt. Greyfeld was right.

"You were reading my mind, weren't you?" I slide my stool away from the table with my feet, and stand up to meet my eyes with Dan's horizon.

Dan's lids perk wider open. "What makes you think that?"

"I saw a silver sheen in your eyes, just a moment ago. The look gave me a nagging feeling of guilt, as if you were searching for something inside of me. I also know that you were reading my mind back in the enchantment room, right after you caught me."

"Well, you aren't wrong that I have searched through your thoughts, at one point or another," Dan admits, "although you should know that I haven't done so without good reason."

"Don't try to evade the question. You know exactly when you invaded my mind. So, tell me: why did you do it?" Part of me feels frustrated that the privacy of my mind has succumbed to another being. Yet another part of me feels exited from the thrill of the questioning, encouraged by the Book to press harder.

"Fristad, for your own safety, I simply cannot tell you when the mind-reading occurred, or my reasoning behind it. If I did, then the book could use that knowledge to its advantage."

"So it's only about the Book now, is it? It has nothing to do with you, how the intimate knowledge of another being might benefit you?" I smile as I cast a watchful gaze at this cloaked void magician. My heart races at the possibility of cornering Dan's logic, exposing his evil.

"Perhaps we should talk about this when you are less heated? We might as well eat some lunch." Without waiting for my response, Dan walks around the table and begins climbing the stone brick stairs behind me.

Wait, why is he leaving? How dare he ignore me again! "Fine, then. But keep in mind that avoiding the questions only makes you look more suspicious."

"Nobody's on trial here." Dan's voice echoes richly against the obsidian walls, along with his footsteps. He stops halfway between the bottom and the first level, and leans his head over the unprotected inner edge, looking down at me. He beckons with his hand. "Come on, aren't you hungry?"

I sigh in exacerbation. As I walk toward the stairs, I become aware of my shriveled stomach releasing small jolts of pain. My mind feels tired, finally responding to the toll of creating so many worlds. As my foot falls upon the first stone brick slab, and then the next few dozen, I look down upon Dan's crafting room. Our short, birch stools stand slanted. Some empty vials lay upon the right edge of the table. A few vials, filled with strangely colored liquids, still rest within the brewing stands, although the steam and grey smoke has since ceased.

I turn my head the other way, and see shelves crammed with books, chests, jars, and artifacts. The sheer amount of books makes me unusually joyful. There are so many. The amount of information that they contain must be humbling. Wouldn't it be wonderful to read all of them?

"Hey Dan, how is it that you have so many books?" I ask.

"Time," he answers briefly.

I wonder exactly how long, but I've probably asked too many questions at this point.

After many flights of stairs, past many levels of wooden flooring, we arrive at the top, where an obsidian wall opens up to a stone passageway. Dan walks through the exit first. As I follow him into the narrow neck of stone, I feel as if I have exited a fog.

After a long moment of wandering down the hallway, we come back to the center room, where a book and quill sit upon a large table. We pass by the table, and enter the kitchen on the other side. Jonas is sitting at the dining table in the chair on the right, reading a book with a green binding. As we walk closer, I notice that the book is titled "The Diamond Factory." It's a dystopian fiction novel. I remember Jonas talking about it earlier.

"Hello, Jonas," Dan greets. "How was your morning?"

"It was swell. I miss the sheep, though. How did it go with Fristad and the book?"

"We made some good progress, actually," Dan replies with a dose of optimism.

"Is that so?"

"Yes. After some tests, I am relatively certain that the spirit influencing Fristad is indeed human."

The Book reacts with anger and shock.


	36. Chapter 35: Our Need to Escape

"What a filthy liar Dan is, to claim that I am human. He is purposefully oblivious to the pain and meaninglessness of the entirety of my existence, belittling me, taunting me with an life I have never had, and to what end? To deceive us into separation. His twisting logic is a danger to our existence."

My jaw clenches in response to the Book's enraging words. We have to do something!

Before I hear the Book's response, Jonas begins to speak.

"How is that even possible?" Jonas wonders, laying his book and his arms down upon the table. "Humans and the void... they just don't mix."

"I am a living exception of that," Dan replies, "and, in a way, you are too. Of course, we are very unusual people. Perhaps the book is an unusual case."

"It isn't exactly unusual for any human to survive in the deep void for thousands of years. Even a void magician like you couldn't survive for long. Plus, an ender-born like me can't be harmed by the void in the first place, which wouldn't make sense if the book felt any pain..." Jonas' brow sinks as he begins to think. "...but that's out of the question, since an Ender Born isn't truly human to begin with."

"I agree, it seems preposterous that a human could be able to survive in the void for that long, but on the other hand, the same could be said for almost any other living thing. All I know is what I've learned from the spells that I've used, which seems to suggest strongly that the book is human. Magic works in strange and sometimes poorly understood ways, so I wouldn't rule anything out."

"I suppose you're right; I just wish there was a better explanation, something that we already understood." Jonas' voice tapers off with his train of thought.

Dan shrugs. "I am not certain that that will be the case. I will just have to do some more tests, and hopefully the book's existence will make more sense by then. On the other hand, perhaps I've assumed something that I shouldn't have. I have no way to know that the book was in the void for as long as it said it was. That would explain a lot, actually." Dan rubs his fingers on either side of his head. "Still, that doesn't explain how it found its way into the deep void... Forget it; I'm rambling. We'll all think clearer after some lunch." Dan's lids rise in sudden realization. "Oh dear, I forgot about the potions!"

Dan turns around and leaves, his hasty steps echoing upon the solid stone floor until they finally fade away. The Book projects a sense of urgency and restlessness.

"I think I better check on what Dan is up to," I nod towards Jonas.

Jonas glimpses at me with a fleeting moment of confusion, but then reciprocates a nod, picking up his book once more.

I jerk away from the table and walk with short, swift steps into the hall, past the middle room with the desk and bookcases, hurried but confused as to why. What is happening? Why am I following Dan?

"You need to search the obsidian room before the ward returns," says the Book. "If my suspicions about its design are correct, it should have something that we need in order to escape."

What is in the obsidian room that we need so badly?

"Do not think the slightest thought about it now. The events will unfold themselves later. Walk faster, you sloth! This may be our only chance to get what we need. If Dan sees you searching for it, he will know too much, and you are far too terrible of a liar to make up for it."

I feel my legs push harder upon the stone floor. My increasing pace reminds me of when I fled the spring fields of the cottage in the dream. My efforts are futile, aren't they?

I look up and see the turn in the hallway approaching closer, perhaps only fifteen meters away now. Five meters. I slow down my quick-crashing steps and tense my movements, feeling slowly for the hard stone beneath my feet. I lean my head beyond the edge of the right wall before stepping softly into the great obsidian room. As I turn my head from left to right, I feel my heart stutter in panic as I spot Dan walking up the stone brick stairs, five floors below me. I crouch down as fast as I can, wincing as I hear the wood creak slightly beneath me.

I can already tell that this is a bad idea.

"There is no time to hesitate. Search the chests."

I crouch-walk towards the wall of chests on the right, away from the staircase. As I approach closer, I notice that the chests are held in place by pale wooden frames.

I approach the chest in the bottom right corner, grip the cool wood with both hands, and open it slowly. Its hinges whistle softly, but it makes no other sound, to my relief. Inside the chest are layers of folded leather with string tied around them, as if there is something inside of them. On top of the folded leather is a metal canteen, a compass, and folded paper, most likely maps.

"That is not quite what we are looking for. Try another chest."

Why would Dan keep travel supplies in here, of all places? Perhaps this large room is also good for storage. I close the chest slowly, then sidestep to my left. This chest is closer to the edge of this floor. I glance to my left, where four levels of wooden flooring are visible on the far side of the wall. I don't see Dan; maybe he's on the other side. I turn my head forward again. As I reach towards the lid of the chest, I feel a slight breeze on my hands. Was that a draft? I bend my head forward towards a gap in the wooden frame. It's too dark to see behind it. I reach my hand towards the gap, but pull it back quickly as I feel the Book observing me.

"Fristad, snap out of it! You need to search the chest."

I lift the lid of the chest. Inside is a pile of rocks of various colors.

"Perfect," the Book coos with satisfaction. "All we need is a small piece of flint. Take it."

I pick up one of the murky grey rocks and close the chest. I can't help but smile with satisfaction. We did it. I turn around and gingerly crouch-walk towards the mouth of the exit before standing up again. As I walk down the hall, I slip the piece of flint into my left back pocket. In my mind's eye, I briefly remember the unusual composition of the mouth of the room: obsidian on all sides, even the bottom. My grin sinks as I realize that I am about to go to a terrible place.

Then I hear someone else's footsteps mirroring mine; I glance behind me and my muscles freeze instinctively as I see Dan walking towards me. Did he hear my footsteps? What if he suspects something?

Dan's unnervingly blue eyes widen as he abruptly stops walking. "Oh! Hello, Fristad. You caught me by surprise. What are you doing here?"

"Um... I forgot something." I struggle to sift through my brain for some excuse for some small, trivial object that I could have left behind, but I can't think of anything. I think back on the excuse I gave to Jonas for suddenly leaving. "I mean... no. I was just checking up on what you were doing."

Dan's brow raises. "You were watching me cork potion bottles?"

Oh no. Dan doesn't believe me. Why would anyone watch him do something as boring as cork potions? Still, I can't just tell him that I wasn't watching him; that would just make me look like more of a liar. I have to pretend like I was watching him.

"I was hoping it would be more interesting than that," I reason.

Dan bursts into laughter as he leans his head back. He looks back at me with a smile. "Well, I suppose I don't blame you."

My muscles relax in relief. Thank Notch that Dan is not suspicious.

-

I find myself sitting at the kitchen table once again. Jonas sits to my right, Dan sits to my left. In front of each of us is a sandwich made with some of Jonas' dried pork.

"I apologize for keeping you waiting," Dan says. "I imagine you are just as starving as I am."

"No worries, cousin." Jonas bites into his sandwich.

I begin eating slowly, forced to hesitate as my fears return. Why is it that Dan seems so forgiving? He can't possibly be so naive that he wouldn't care that I was in the room with him. Did he leave the kitchen on purpose, to see how I would react?

The Book chimes in. "Regardless of how much Dan knows, our need to escape continues to grow more urgent. You saw the potions he drank to cast those powerful spells. You saw the diamond sword that he had. He could easily kill you if he wanted to."

But Dan wouldn't want to kill me, would he? I'm his cousin's best friend.

"Perhaps you have had too much faith in Jonas."

I observe Jonas out of the corner of my vision, his glowing eyes barely visible from beneath his hood. What is it about Jonas that makes me so uneasy? There is evil in those eyes. And somehow, despite all the years that I've known him as a friend, despite all the years that I've grown to trust him, I resent him. I resent his kind. Something about Endermen fills me with hatred, and by extension, Ender-borns. And I don't know why.


	37. Chapter 36: Trials of the Past

The large tome of Qualia is open once again. Dan flips through the thin pages until his finger lands upon the words which he seeks.

"Are you ready?" Dan asks with a sigh.

"I guess so," I reply, a bit more nervous than before.

The Book speaks, "Of course we know that every spell that Dan casts on us puts us at a disadvantage, but we have no choice. Our best hope of escaping tonight depends on Dan's ability to trust you, which in turn depends on your willingness to succumb to his spells."

Dan ingests his purple potion, and braces himself on the table in pain for a long minute. I then uncork and drink my potion, a yellow one this time, and notice that it tastes slightly sweet. As I drop my empty vial onto the table, Dan begins to recite a spell. His voice fills my ears before growing into a deafening whirlwind of chaos. My vision flashes and pulsates ever more wildly, until the whirlwind of wild shapes consumes me. I feel as if a great deal of time has been erased, and now has yet to pass.

-

I look around the classroom, trying to find a grain of something familiar. Everyone else seems so happy when they're talking with each other; why not me? Why do I have to be alone?

I search across the people sitting at each desk, but all of their faces are of strangers. Where is Airlass? She said she would be here.

I look again at the blackboard at the front of the classroom, where the teacher has begun writing with chalk. The excited classroom chatter continues. Who was the teacher's name again? Thornberry? Wildthorn? Blackthorn? I forgot what it was. It was some sort of Nearlands name with the word "thorn" in it. I heard from Mom that the teacher writes their name on the blackboard when they come to the front of the class. I don't think I see their name yet.

I pick up my pencil and balance it upon the tips of my fingers. One by one, I lower a finger, until only my index finger touches it. I breathe a deep sigh as I focus upon the pencil, imagining it fixed in place. I lower the last finger, and the pencil follows it, dropping onto the ground, to my disappointment.

A finger taps on my shoulder. As I turn around, I lock with the brown eyes of a strange-yet-charming man. He wears a leather jacket, a fur cap, and a five-o-clock shadow. Between his fingers, he grasps a bronze, five credit bullion. The man flicks the coin into the air and holds his palm out. The coin halts its fall just above his palm, spinning rapidly as it bobs slightly up and down. Then the coin suddenly stops spinning, and then slowly spins the other way, before finally dropping into his hand.

My jaw drops. "That's a neat trick," I note with admiration.

The man winks. "Perhaps I will show you some time."

Then I notice that there are oak trees behind him.

"Hey, I never knew that there were trees in this classroom..."

The dream collapses underneath me as the paradox unravels.

-

"What did you see?" Dan asks, looking intently at me, realizing before I do that my brows are furrowed in confusion.

I think upon the dream carefully, trying to hold onto the memory, so as not to forget it. Somehow the dream makes me feel nostalgic; it resonates with the blissful feeling of childhood innocence. Not unlike the cottage dream I had last night.

"I was in a classroom when a man tapped on my shoulder and showed me a coin suspended in mid-air."

"What sort of man?" Dan inquires, confused.

"He looked like a hunter, I think. He was wearing a leather jacket and a fur cap, and looked like he hadn't shaved in a week. He was also quite charming."

"Charming? That's a bit of an odd word to describe another man."

"I'm just saying that's what he looked like!" I snap.

"I apologize for judging you. It's just that... I didn't realize that you were..." Dan's voice trails off as he searches for the right word.

"What? No! That's not how it is at all!"

Dan blinks rapidly. "Okay, okay. Let's just forget about it then. Still, I'm quite intrigued as to who this man might be. Correct me if I'm wrong: you said that the man was levitating a coin?"

I shrug. "Yes, that's what happened."

"Interesting..." Dan clasps his fingers together. "You don't suppose that this was the same magician in the other vision?"

I shake my head. "No, this man seemed much different. He was friendly. The other man looked like he wanted to kill me."

"Hmm, interesting..." Dan repeats, in roughly the same even, emotionless voice, as if in deep thought. He pushes himself up from the table. "Alright, let me get you another potion."

Dan walks over to a shelf on the side of the wall, where all the corked potions are stored. He picks up an opaque yellow potion and a translucent orange potion.

I hear a thump as Dan's hand places the corked glass vial in front of me. I grasp the vial and uncork it, then wait for Dan to sit down.

"Are you ready?" Dan's eyes are glued upon the tome as he fingers through the sliver-thin pages.

"Yes, ready when you are." I nod.

Dan returns a nod, uncorks his orange potion, and leans the vial back into his mouth. I lean my yellow potion into my lips and swallow. It is cold and slightly numbing, almost minty, then my lips pinch impulsively in response to its terribly bitter aftertaste. I hope to Notch that I will never have to drink this awful potion again.

I listen nervously to Dan's incomprehensible spell, counting the seconds before the world twists into oblivion, taking my consciousness with it.

-

"Notch smite it! Fristad, where are you?" I hear my father's worried voice calling from a distance.

It is dark. I struggle to keep my fingers from slipping from the steel sword, as the cold, hard hilt is too thick for my grasp, and my arms strain to hold the sword up under its weight. Dad's leather armor feels baggy and is difficult to run in without tripping. I look behind me, breathing heavily as I see a skeleton running after me, cocking another arrow into its bow. I laugh hysterically. It can't hit me. I'm too fast.

I turn my head forward again. There is a creeper wandering out in front of me, but I'm not afraid.

I hear the snap of a whizzing arrow and dash to my right, before the wavering stick plunges into the dirt. I strain my arms harder as I lift my sword, then veer back towards the skeleton, flanking it.

"Fristad, get away! You are in grave danger!" Dad's voice is perhaps only a few feet behind me.

There is a deadly urgency to his voice, such that I abandon my attack on the skeleton and sprint away as fast as I can. Within a second, I feel the ground pull my legs out from underneath me as a screeching bang crushes my ears. As my chest crashes upon the earth, I hear a ringing in my ears and see stars all around me.

I push myself up as fast as I can and look behind me. Dad and the skeleton are both laying on the ground; both are still, but Dad is breathing heavily. He is missing a leg. The skeleton is missing a head.

Tears well up in my eyes. "Daddy!" I cry.

A moment passes in silence before Dad's hand reaches towards me.

"Fristad, calm down." Dad croaks weakly. "I'm going to be fine. Get me back to the house."

Dad's form shakes and twists into the darkness. I feel a thick rope tighten around my chest. I am hanging from it. As I look down into the blue sky, I feel as if gravity has been reversed, but then when I look up, I realize I am hanging beneath the crags of bedrock, with tongues of silver crashing against the rocks like an ocean, and floating all around me. I feel the heat of a sickly fever, which progresses into biting pain, which becomes burning, which then proceeds to tear my flesh apart. I scream in agony, pulling at the hanging rope, but I can already feel the strength in my arms growing weaker.

"You monster!" I cry out. "Pull me out of here, if at all you value my humanity! Have mercy!"

"Just a little while longer..." A man's voice calling from a hole in the crag of bedrock replies calmly.

I let my muscles go limp, as I realize that I am about to die. The pain suppresses all my other thoughts; I feel a numbness as my vision fades.

The pain begins to subside. I think it's finally over... but then I feel a faint tug on my chest... and then nothing.

After a while, I feel a hardness forming underneath me. The world fades back in, stone walls lit by flickering torchlight. I feel a throbbing pain; curious of the source I glance down at my arms, and gasp in shock at the wide gashes, lined with wisps of flowing silver. The fever has not subsided.

I wince in pain as a hard hand grasps my shoulder.

"We'll try again tomorrow."


	38. Chapter 37: Impasse

A hand pokes urgently at my shoulder. "Fristad, are you okay?"

I gasp myself awake, my chest pressing against the cold floor. Remembering the very same man who hung me by ropes in the heat of the void, I growl with hatred, roll over onto my back, and kick the Notch-forsaken magician in his jaw.

"To the Nether with you, you hopeless demon!" I cry with burning anger. "You had made me a fool. I should have known that it was you who caused me all this pain. Why is it that I let myself play your stupid game?"

"Fristad, I'm confused," the man replies, unphased. He didn't even seem to flinch. "Why don't you tell me what the matter is with you before you try to kick me again?"

The man's face jitters, his eyes flickering between brown and blue, before his form materializes as Dan. I grimace with embarrassment as I realize it was him that I just kicked.

"Oh shoot, I'm so very sorry..."

"Don't be," Dan replies. "Please, just tell me what you saw."

I sigh, hesitant to recall the bitter memories. "I saw my father's leg get blown off by a Creeper. And then I was burning in the void again. This time I was hanging from some ropes. There was a man calling from above the bedrock, telling me that I needed to wait just a little bit longer. Then, I lost consciousness. I woke up with wide silver gashes in my arms."

Dan gazes distantly, saying nothing. After a short while, he takes a deep breath. "Is that actually something that happened to your father? Is he missing a leg?"

I nod. "He is."

"Then I think we're done here." Dan reaches his hand down toward mine. "Do you need a hand?"

I lift my hand up toward his grasp. Dan's hand locks around mine and pulls me slowly onto my feet. "Thanks. But... what do you mean that we're done here?" I ask.

"I mean that I've learned everything that I need to know... at least, as far as qualia could tell me. That isn't saying much, however. There is still much work to be done."

"What do you mean?"

"Well, I mean, I have to confront the book, of course." Dan chuckles.

"Isn't that kind of dangerous?"

"Very dangerous, actually. I don't see any alternatives, though. I must understand how powerful the book really is. I at least have a good idea of what to expect." Dan holds his hand forward, palm exposed. "May I see it?"

I raise my brow. "Do you honestly think I would just give the Book to you?"

Dan squints in challenge. "Well, it's either the book, or both of you. And the spell I intend to cast is rather painful."

I am suddenly rattled with intense fear. There is bloodlust in those eyes. I can feel it.

But that isn't true. I struggle against the fear. With a sudden burst of volition, I clear my thoughts. The Book is trying to control me. It wants me to hate Dan. I can't listen to it.

"Do not give me up to him, Fristad," the Book warns. "Call him on his bluff. He would never intend to hurt you... at least, not yet. Hold your ground against him, and he will have no choice but to give up on his assault."

And why should I listen to you? All this time, you've been a manipulative parasite, making me act against my will, even against my own conscience. I want you gone.

"Don't you dare call me such things! I would do the same to protect you, would I not? Is there no sacred ground between us? Would you discard our friendship? Even when you have nothing to lose? Surely you are not that selfish and short-sighted to want me gone? Do you not realize that if you give me up to him, that you will feel the same pain that I feel?"

I feel the Book trying to expand the guilt inside of me, but I resist it. I ignore its words. I could care less if the Book forces its pain upon me. Freedom feels so close. If Dan manages to weaken the Book, even just a little bit, then perhaps this will all soon be over. I reach into my back pocket, grab hold of the Book, and hand it to Dan.

Dan walks over to the other side of the room, places the Book onto the floor, and steps back. Suddenly, the Book is consumed in a shower of purple sparks, followed by a loud, acute screech.

"Drat!" Dan blurts out.

I hear a female voice laughing. "Was that supposed to be an attack spell?" The Book taunts. "I felt nothing. So much for fearing for my life. This man Vrendan is hardly a magician."

As the purple smoke clears, I see the Book lying on the floor, just as before, perfectly intact. The floor beneath it is dented like a tiny crater. I realize with sorrow that my troubles with the Book are far from over.

"What just happened? How did the Book survive?" I ask Dan.

"The Book is guarded by Ender-magic. I should have known. No wonder I couldn't feel its presence."

"Ender-magic?" the Book inquires coyly. "Does Dan mean to insinuate that I am immersed in the same substance which fills the shadowed monsters of the void?" There is disgust in the Book's voice, but also a hint of sarcasm, as if the Book already knew that this was going to happen. I begin to question why the Book didn't tell me it was immune to void magic, but the thought is quickly submerged.

"Ender-magic... as in Endermen?" I echo from the Book.

"Yes and no. It is the same sort of magic, but I am certain that the book is not an Enderman. That complicates things." Dan shakes his head in dismay. "My void magic will be useless against it."

"Why don't you just cut it in half with your diamond sword, then?" I ask.

"Given what I know now, I fear that that may be too dangerous."

My heart sinks further, as I realize that my troubles may even be beyond Dan's expertise. "Does that mean you won't be able to help me?"

"No, most certainly not! Although, given the nature of my trade, I won't be able to do this on my own."

"What do you propose that we do, then?"

"Well, first I will try to ask Jonas if he can help us. If not, then we will have to find someone else."

-

We find Jonas outside in the fields, observing the hogs chewing at the dead grass. Sunshine trots toward Dan and bounces upon her forepaws, pointing her maw up Dan's leg.

Dan gently pushes the dog's nose away. "Sunshine, that's enough. Now is not the time."

"Hello there," Jonas says as he turns to face us. "How are the tests going?"

"We've arrived at an impasse," says Dan. "I have used enough qualia spells to help me understand the book's identity, but we've discovered that the book is a beacon for Ender-magic. Of course, me being a void magician, that discovery is somewhat problematic."

Dan knows the Book's identity? Why hasn't he told me?

"What are you going to do now, then?" Jonas responds.

"I was actually wondering if it would be possible for you to help us."

Jonas' gaze sinks downwards. He takes in a breath in preparation to speak, but then he hesitates. "I don't think I can do that."

"Why not?"

"Do you even have to ask?" Jonas' voice rises in volume. He glares at Dan with annoyance before glancing down again.

"This is about the suppression, isn't it?" Dan inquires.

"It is and it isn't. I don't want to talk about it." Jonas keeps his gaze low.

"What sort of suppression?" I ask.

Dan holds up a finger towards me, mouthing "hold on" with his lips. "What else besides the suppression is preventing you from helping us?"

"Nothing. Just forget that I said that."

"Jonas, if you are hiding something from me that might..."

"I thought I said: 'I don't want to talk about it,'" Jonas mouths slowly, a hint of restrained anger in his voice.

"But can you help us?" Dan presses on.

"Is it at all possible that you could find someone else? You know how long it's taken for me to get this far."

"Jonas, I'm all for exploring all possible options," Dan reasons, "but right now, you are our best hope. There is no one else within miles that we could trust to help us. And the sooner that we help Fristad, the more quickly he will be able to recover. So will you do it for Fristad?"

Jonas lets out a deep sigh. "Let's continue talking about this indoors."


	39. Chapter 38: Seeds of Doubt

"Alright Jonas, speak your mind," Dan says.

The three of us are sitting at the study table, the vertex of the four hallways. A black ink bottle housing a feather quill lies in its exact center. No books or artifacts remain on the table; all are stored neatly in the shelves of each of the four corners of the room.

"I don't know what I'm supposed to say. I felt like I've already said what I needed to say," Jonas replies vaguely.

"And that is...?"

"I don't want to use my Ender-magic. I thought I made that clear."

I interject, "Because of the suppression, right? What is the suppression, anyways?"

Jonas' purple irises gaze at me with sorrow. "Do you really want to know? The knowledge won't help you."

Jonas' straightforward question catches me off-guard. It seems as if, briefly, Jonas has offered to open up to me. But do I trust myself enough as a friend to hold on to one of his secrets?

"It may even make you to decide not to do things that are in your own interest," Jonas adds. He probably notices that I am hesitating, and wants to see if he can change my mind.

I reason aloud, "If the knowledge explains why you can't use your Ender-magic to help me, then I think that I should know. Besides, you are my friend."

Jonas smiles faintly, but only for a moment. "Then you should know that I am trying to become more human. In order to do so, I must avoid using Ender-magic entirely. That's why it's called 'suppression.' I am suppressing the side of myself which makes me like an Enderman."

Dan pipes in. "Jonas' body is composed of two forms of magic, Ender and earth. If he can avoid using Ender-magic and strengthen his connection with the earth, then his earth side, his human side, will eventually overshadow it."

Eventually? As in, his human side is not dominant yet? "How long have you been doing this?" I ask Jonas.

"Seventeen years," Jonas responds.

"Wow, that's a very long time." I turn the dates over in my head. That was around the time I met Jonas, wasn't it?

Jonas nods. "The process has taken me a long time. That's because it's not supposed to happen. It's unnatural."

"Don't think so lowly of yourself, cousin." Dan pats Jonas on the shoulder. "It is a choice that you have made. And you have put a great deal of effort into it."

"I know." Jonas sighs. "I just worry that refusing to help Fristad might put him in danger."

"Fristad's recovery is a process, not a discrete series of steps which must be followed," Dan responds. "I apologize for pressing my request so hard upon you. I only wanted you to take my request seriously. But the decision is still yours."

Jonas turns towards me. "What do you think, Fristad? Should I do it?"

"I have faith that things will turn out fine either way. And I respect your choice to not use Ender-magic," I respond.

"But would you still say that, had you not known why I chose to refuse?"

I shrug. "I prefer empathy over ignorance."

Do I really have faith that things will turn out okay? I don't know; a part of me feels I am still doomed to become the Book's slave either way. I suppose that I told Jonas a white lie, but it was a lie to keep him from worrying about me. I'm sure he has done the same for me. I believe he has done so in my best interest, even though his secrecy makes me uneasy.

I can feel the Book clawing at my mind, telling me that I am forgetting something, but I am trying very hard to suppress it.

"In that case, Jonas, I would like for you to share with me what you can about Ender-magic that you think may be relevant," Dan says, "and I'll see if that knowledge can help us."

Thus, Dan and Jonas begin to exchange words with each other. At first, the conversation starts off as metaphysical, almost spiritual in nature. But the conversation quickly spirals down into a sea of technical jargon, until I can't understand a word they are saying. How the heck does Jonas know all of this stuff?

The Book speaks, "There is a great deal about Jonas which we do not know. We certainly know very little about Jonas' relationship with Dan. It is obvious that the two of them share an intimate knowledge of magic, but this is unexplained by the fact that Jonas has worked as a shepherd since he was fourteen, if your memory is accurate."

You can access my memories?

Blazes, the Book can access my memories. Is there no corner of my mind that is not secure from the Book's presence?

"I am merely drawing from your recollection of the day you met Jonas, triggered from your inquiry about his suppression. There is no need for such deep probing. Let us not, however, forget why such knowledge is important. Let us draw our attention to Dan. Notice how his hair has lost all of its hue; it is a wiry grey. His voice is very deep and his nose is fleshy from age. With that knowledge in mind, one would suppose that Dan is perhaps in his sixties or seventies. However, a discrepancy arises. Look at his skin. Its form is supple and its wrinkles are light, and it is free of the spots of discoloration that one would expect from the skin of a man of his ripe age. Now, look at his eyes. Notice how clear they are, how vibrant of a blue with which his old irises shine, how rapidly they dart from Jonas to you and back. Why do you suppose that is the case?"

As I more closely observe Dan's face as he speaks, I can't help but focus upon his unnervingly blue eyes. Perhaps I noticed unconsciously that there was something out of the ordinary about them, but I didn't realize what that was. I didn't even notice his skin until you mentioned it, but I can see how there is a discrepancy there. Dan is apparently in very good health.

"And what else would keep Dan in such good health but his powerful magic? There is no telling how old Dan is. His longevity would explain how he has managed to amass such a great number of books, artifacts, and supplies. Dan may be short on credits, but he is indeed a very wealthy man. Thus, there appears to be a great age difference between Dan and Jonas. There are only two resolutions to this issue. The first is that Jonas and Dan are not cousins. The second is that Jonas is not thirty-one years old. Either, way, Jonas lied to you. Given that knowledge, do you still trust Jonas, even though he has not been honest to you?"

I reflect on the many years I have known Jonas, both as a partner on the farm and as a best friend. Jonas may not be perfectly honest with his words, but he is an honest person.

"Do you still think so, on top of the fact that Jonas has kept so many secrets from you?" the Book counters. "You hardly know anything about his past. Do you not think that it is odd that his supposed 'cousin,' despite his great wealth, lives in a slum, doing business with half-bloods and Nether looters?"

Nether looters? What are those?

"Do you not remember the man who visited Dan this morning, wearing chainmail stained with the blood and slime of Nether pigmen? The same man whose boss was notoriously late on his payment?"

Well, I suppose I remember the bald man who was wearing chainmail armor, but I had no idea he was a Nether looter, let alone any idea what a Nether looter actually is.

"Regardless, the important point which I am trying to make is that Dan is a dangerous man who solicits business from dangerous people. If Jonas is as honest as you say he is, he ought not to be associated with that man. But, alas, he is. It doesn't help either that void magicians and Ender-beings have a notorious history."

What makes you say that void magicians and Ender-beings have a notorious history?

"Common sense."

What is that supposed to mean? I bet you pulled that idea out of your non-existent butthole. You're just saying all of these things to try to make me suspicious of my best friend.

"Do not deny the truth which you see in front of you. It is clear that Jonas and Dan are not trustworthy. If you continue to treat Jonas as your friend, I assure you, you will come to regret your actions."


	40. Chapter 39: Redstone

The rest of the day was quite boring.

I sat in a chair for an hour or so while Dan and Jonas continued to ramble back and forth. Finally they stood up from their chairs simultaneously and agreed that the Book is very mysterious and they don't really know how to deal with it. Afterwards, Dan led me back down into the obsidian room and asked me a great deal of questions about my life. A few were somewhat personal, but I answered them anyway. Given the fact that I was sitting across from a hooded man with a diamond sword, capable of controlling an aether of destruction, who may-or-may-not be associated with dangerous criminal organizations, I felt compelled to comply. At least he asked politely.

Now I'm sitting cross-legged at the head of the guestroom bed. Jonas sits to my right, rubbing his hands together slowly and intently.

I don't feel like talking to him right now. It's not as if I'm angry at Jonas; I'm just not in the greatest of moods after a long day of throat-drying life stories and soul-grinding boredom.

How much I'd give to Jeb to be outside right now. Dan became progressively more paranoid throughout the day, insisting that Jonas "keep an eye" on me while I wasn't in his sight. Dan later told me that I wouldn't be able to go outside after the sun set. I think it already has.

Oddly enough, many of the questions that Dan asked were about Jonas. There was a sharpness to his gaze, as if he didn't think I was telling the truth, but every so often an electrifying, silver shimmer would flit across his eyes, and his skepticism would fade away.

-

I remember telling Dan about the time I met Jonas. I was walking around in the dark at night, but I wasn't out looking for trouble. I was lost, and didn't truly understand the dangerous things which walked upon the unlit ground. I didn't have a weapon or any armor, just clothes.

Then trouble came looking for me, in the form of floating bones and tattered flesh. When I was surrounded, I kneeled down, closed my eyes, and screamed. I heard the ringing of a bashing steel blade and jarring screams of unearthly agony. When I opened my eyes, a tall, cloaked figure, wearing aviator goggles and a bandana over their face, outstretched their gloved hand towards me. I grasped the leather and they lifted me up.

"You really shouldn't be out here," the teenage boy said.

"How did you find me?" I ask, bewildered that I survived.

"All that matters is that you're safe," he responded, deferring the question.

-

It's strange how Jonas doesn't wear goggles or a bandana anymore.

I look back at Jonas. Between his thumb and his forefinger is a tiny, translucent, teal-colored marble. He blows upon it sharply but briefly, as if to clean off the dust. He then lays it back into his palm, and gently rubs his hands together in a circular motion.

I suddenly realize I am thirsty, and decide to break the silence. "Hey Jonas, I think I'm going to go get some water."

Jonas yawns. "Alright, then."

I walk out the door and walk towards the stairwell. Footsteps begin to echo behind me. I glance behind me and see Jonas following me, to my annoyance. Of course. I almost forgot Dan's new surveillance rule.

We ascend the stairwell up to the library floor, step down the opened passageway, and turn right to enter the kitchen. We both grunt in surprise as we almost run into Dan as he is sipping from a glass. Two other glasses of water stand behind him on the counter.

"Oh, hello there!" Dan greets jovially. "Perfect timing. I was pouring myself some water when I figured I'd come down and ask if you'd like some."

"Wow, thanks," I reply, taking the glass of water that Dan hands to me. I gulp it down hastily, emptying nearly half the glass before tilting it forward for a break. I begin to sense a bitter and slightly sour aftertaste which reminds me of redstone dust. A tense nervousness builds up in my chest, causing my grip to tighten around the glass.

"Drink no more of that," the Book admonishes. "Redstone is a potion ingredient. Dan is trying to drug you."

"Hey Dan," Jonas speaks out, "are you sure this water is alright? It tastes a bit funny."

Dan shrugs. "The well level is a bit low, so I imagine the water is harder than usual."

"Ah, that makes sense," Jonas continues drinking his water.

I stare at my half-filled glass, thirsty but reluctant. If the Book is right, then why would Dan try to drug Jonas as well?

"Put the glass down, Fristad," the Book demands. "The risk of the poison is not worth satiating your thirst."

I breathe in and out in a moment of thought. I shouldn't listen to what the Book says. It only wants to manipulate me. I shrug, and gulp the rest of the cool water down into my throat, restraining building feelings of fear as it bends and presses upon the walls of my mind. As the last drop of water flows from the glass into my mouth, the siege comes to an abrupt end, followed by a lingering sense of fear and shock.

"You will regret that," says the Book.

Whatever. I yawn.

As I walk back into the bedroom with Jonas and slide into bed, I wait in vain for the supposed poison to set in. I don't feel sick at all, but I'm definitely glad to finally be in bed.

"Good night, Jonas," I mutter lazily.

"'Night, Fristad," Jonas responds with a final yawn, before we both fall silent.

-

I find myself clenching my knees as I sit upon a stool, unsure of what to do. Loud, boisterous voices and clinking glasses echo around me. To my left is the man with the leather jacket and the fur cap. He leans his elbows on the counter, leaning forward intently. A woman on the other side places a large, filled mug in front of him.

"Thank you, ma'am." The man nods as he tips forward his fur cap.

"Where are we?" I blurt out.

The man turns his unnerving gaze upon me. "We are in the Britwal Tavern."

"Yes, but WHERE are we?" I insist, having never heard of such a place.

"I will tell you later. Please don't whine like that."

"Excuse me, missy," a friendly voice calls out behind me. I turn around and see a hulky man with hair down to his chin, wearing a sweat-soaked shirt and long, slightly tattered pants. A scabbard and pickaxe are tied to his belt. "Are you lost?"

"No, she's with me," the man next to me replies.

"Sir, you really ought to know that a tavern is no place for–"

"Mister miner, where is he taking me?" I plead.

The hulky man's eyes widen in shock. "You took – gyaaa!" With the sound of a thump, the man winces and stretches his neck in pain.

The man with the fur cap is now standing up. His leg is pressed down upon the other man's foot. "Stay away from her," he snarls.

The hulky man pulls his foot back and composes himself. "I thought I smelled something fishy about you. You oughta back off before your puny frame gets a fist in the wrong place, you sick fool!"

"Take back your threat. You don't want to fight me," the other man counters, staring him down with a grin.

"Nice try, little man. Now, this is your last chance to walk away unscathed: leave the girl alone."

"I refuse."

The miner yells as he throws his fist into the leather-capped man's face. Suddenly, he halts and screeches in pain. I hear a hissing, burning sound. The miner is bent over onto his knees. The man with the fur cap leans over him with his elbow locked beneath the miner's jaw.

"What I'd really like right now," the man with the fur cap whispers, his tone alternating rapidly between a sardonic snarl and a playful giggle, "is a little bit of respect."


	41. Chapter 40: One Choice

"Fristad, wake up! Now is not the time to let your mind wander; we're running out of time."

I gasp for air as my lids swing open. I can feel the Book's desperate urgency pulling my muscles, begging me to get out of bed, but the weight of tiredness presses against me, tempting my weak body with the sweet ambrosia of perfect sleep. My lids close reflexively. I feel myself fading into the soft clouds of the mattress once again.

"Fristad, you do not need any more sleep. The tiredness you are feeling is from a sleeping potion. Do not give in to it."

A sleeping potion again? Are you serious?

I focus my willpower upon my arms, forcing them against the mattress and lifting myself forward until my feet land onto the solid floor beside the bed. My balance tilts as my vision is clouded with fog and colorful specks, forcing me to press my hand against the rough stone wall.

Finally the headrush passes its course, but the heavy tiredness remains. I turn right and see Jonas' cloaked head upon his pillow, lids closed, face calmed with deep sleep.

So Dan really did slip something into my drink. But what about Jonas? Is he alright?

"I do not know what Dan intends to do. However, if he has learned at all from our attempted escape the previous night, then we should expect our current escape to be much more difficult. You cannot let him see you. If he does, you must be prepared to run."

What about yesterday night, when he drew his sword, and my only choice was to talk? How do I expect to come out unscathed if he can chase after me with void magic and a diamond sword?

"I am done reasoning with that man. You need to get as far away from him as possible, and keep him blind to your presence until he assumes that you are dead and I am forgotten."

How do you expect that to happen? There's no telling how long Dan will keep looking for me. And besides, it would take years for Dan to assume that I'm dead.

Or maybe it wouldn't. I recall the obsidian frame of the great room with nervousness, and picture old textbook illustrations of flaming brimstone, mutilated humanoid pigs, and pale screaming hulks with dread. I would be far from the first to disappear into the Nether. I just hope I make it out of there alive.

"Remember that Dan is of greater concern to us. Now, we must hurry. Find your sword."

I walk around the bed and towards the bookshelf, where the floor is covered with haphazardly dropped bags and satchels, their leather surfaces cast in shadow by the slanted yellow light of glowstone. I spot my own personal satchel tucked within the left corner. There it is. I bend down and unstrap the buckle which holds the satchel shut, pull the mouth of the satchel apart, and lift the bag towards me. It feels way too light. I peer inside. There doesn't appear to be anything else in here besides clothes. I reach my hand in. I hope to feel something solid, but all I feel is fabric and leather.

I'm starting to feel worried. I don't know where my sword is. Come on, Fristad, retrace your steps.

I clench my brow as I try to remember when I last had my sword. I was packing my satchel when Jonas was at my door, and I know I had my sword then because I remember strapping it onto my waste. Where did it go then? I know I still had it when Jonas and I first got to Zomem, because I reached for it when I saw the creeper halfblood. But after that... I don't remember. How did it disappear all of a sudden? I must have dropped it somewhere.

Of course! My satchel has a side pocket. It must be in there. I reach my hand in, but to my disappointment, my fingers wrap around a wooden handle. It's just my axe. There's no way I could defend myself with that. It's not like I can go all Airlass on those Nether demons.

"You do not need the sword for self-defense. You just need something made of steel so that you can light the portal."

But how am I supposed to defend myself?

"Your armor will take effect and provide sufficient disguise. Would you please stop asking questions? Every moment spent speculating means Dan is more likely to find us. You must leave now."

You're right. We need to go.

I clench my fist around the axe's cylindrical wooden grip. Tensing my steps as I walk, I sidestep through the doorway of the bedroom and follow the hallway to the stairs. I gently but swiftly place a foot upon each successive step until I finally reach the floor of library shelves. I peer beyond the edge of the leftmost bookcase. Diffuse light glows across the floor. The hidden passageway is open. Should I go inside?

"You don't have a choice," the Book warns.

I walk towards the passageway, wary of the silence. Something about those five words causes me to fixate upon them. I know what they mean. I'm prolonging the inevitable. If I stay still, I'm waiting in vain while Dan is more likely to find me. Likewise, if I resist the Book's words, I fight in vain while the Book's influence continues to grow on me. However, there is something else about the words which intrigue me. Somehow it reminds me of the dreams that I've been having recently.

I'm at the bottom of the steps now, in the study room. I don't know where Dan is. I would rather not know.

I turn left and begin walking down the long passageway. My heart pumps faster. If there's any moment that Dan might notice me, it's during the half a minute that I'm walking down this passageway. I want so much to run, but I'm afraid that I will make too much noise. I just want this passageway to end.

Finally, the obsidian mouth of the great room appears from the right. Suddenly I feel irrationally nervous. I think the ward is starting to kick in. I'm still really tired, too. Jeez, Dan, why won't you give me a break?

I reach my right hand behind me and pull the flint out of my pocket. I kneel down in front of the obsidian frame and chafe my axe against the flint, creating a yellow spark. The spark falls upon the black rock, igniting more sparks, which dance and jitter erratically across the surface, like water in a hot pan, before dying off. Frustrated, I strike the flint again. Yet more yellow sparks flit across the obsidian before dying, just like my hopes of escape.

Dan would kill me if he saw me doing this. I have to get out of here. I can't do this anymore. If anything, I'm going to catch myself on fire.

The Book admonishes my words with anger and impatience. "Fristad, you are paranoid from the ward. You must not give up now. Strike the flint closer to the frame."

I want so badly to leave this awful place, but the Book's words keep me going. I lower the flint until my knuckles rest upon the ground. I strike the flint sideways with my axe. A yellow spark multiplies and becomes a yellow flame, which turns to white, which turns to silver, which turns to a dark violet. I step back. The flame spreads and expands, climbing up the walls and collapsing in on itself into a wobbling purple membrane.

I can't wait to leave this place. I step through. The world is now submerged in a purple fog, tipping from side to side, gradually tilting ever more so each time, until the upper floors of the obsidian room become a twisted mess of broken reality. The jerking motion gives me terrible nausea. Suddenly I am thrust forward into an empty space of a grainy blackness, which seems to condense a nervous, pent-up energy within my chest. The pull of space then takes a sharp right, and I feel now as if I am falling, until I find myself standing within another purple fog, surrounded by an oppressive heat. As I wait for the stretched realities to bend back into their original form and I step through the portal, I realize that this place is not the Nether that I have read about in books. I am in a room with stone brick walls, white tiled floor, and a stone ceiling. There are no windows of any kind. In front of me is a hallway leading into a red fog. There are no undead swine grunts or creepy demonic moans, only silence.

An unavoidable fear explodes inside of me, forcing me to run forward, heart pounding, breaths heavy, away from the portal, away from the ward. Then I feel a freezing chill. It begins at my toes and works its way upward, melding a rock-like stiffness into my joints. I feel the workings of my heart and my lungs turn silent, then finally the red fog of the Nether becomes a bright white light.


	42. Chapter 41: Arbiter of the Flame

The echo of my clanking boots against the white tiled floor slows steadily. The irrational fear dilutes with each meter I distance myself from my former prison, the obsidian room, Dan's cursed abode. I feel glorious relief as I am finally able to ground myself upon my two feet. I look behind me.

The faraway portal's glow dimly stains the red fog with a purple hue. The white tiles on the floor of the corridor are worn down to their grout, and are sunken from the weight of perhaps countless feet. The stone brick walls of the corridor are corrugated with countless side passages, although I wouldn't dare explore any passage so close to that terrible portal. Lines of dimly lit torches adorn the long walls, most no more than glowing embers, others burnt out completely. I suppose even a crafted torch cannot burn forever.

I turn the other way. This side of the corridor also fades into the red fog, however there is no end in sight. I might as well start searching the side passages for a way out.

I walk towards the nearest passage on my right and enter it. It seems as if this passage is identical to the first; the same worn white tiles pattern the floor; the same fading torches hang upon the walls; the same side passages indent into the stone bricks. Does this maze of passages even end?

I suppose the only way for me to find out is to move forward. I will surely become lost.

Many dying torches pass by. The corridor gradually stretches into a spacious hall. Walls of torches on the walls give way to a lane of glowstone on the floor. Obsidian bricks begin to intertwine in a spiral pattern with the stone bricks, before smoothly transitioning to pure obsidian. The red fog recedes.

The hall opens up into a grand room with eight walls, every other wall leading to another passageway. In the center is a stone statue of two elegantly posed figures, larger than life, engaged in what appears to be a fight to the death. One figure, adorned with lapis lazuli, stands tall, leaning forward with pride as they hold their sword up against the other figure's arm. The other figure, adorned with white marble, leans back with knees bent, one fist clenched against the floor while the other fist clenches a pickaxe which digs into the shoulder of the figure standing over them. The eyes of the figure adorned with lapis are neither angry nor afraid; indeed, they are not focused on the other figure at all, but are instead pointed skyward. Curious, I follow the lapis figure's eyes up to the ceiling, where a diamond-eyed face stares down brooding, their head surrounded with etchings of the sun's rays, which are in turn surrounded by a sea of stars and clouds carved elegantly into a dome relief.

I approach the statue and notice a rusted placard at its base. I bend down to read it...

"Behold! The Twin Titans fight their final battle, and the Arbiter of Good shall be the victor. All followers of the Arbiter of Good shall be in forth-life blessed by the Watcher, whilst all followers of the Arbiter of Evil shall be in forth-life cursed. Our kingdom is the kingdom of the Arbiter of Good."

What a beautiful, impossible fantasy! If only life were as black and white as the idealistic fight between good and evil, my troubles would be so much simpler, yet no Stephen-Herobrine story can explain what brought me here.

I walk past the statue, towards the hallway on the other side. I walk briskly for several minutes, then stop at an arbitrary intersection and take a left. I should try to head in some direction that's unpredictable.

-

I finally approach the end of another white-tiled corridor, where another, larger Nether portal rests. I can hear trapped gasses hissing and groaning as the purple plasma swirls.

I step onto the obsidian frame and brace myself as the world twists and folds into confusion. I am thrust into a blackness and jerked out of it with ungraceful haste.

I feel in front of me with my foot until I find solid ground, and step out into this unknown place.

There is no red fog here, only the light from the dying embers of ancient torches, so it is comparatively dark, but no trouble for my skeleton eyes...

The light goes dark. I compulsively gasp for air. I can feel my heart beat again.

...I guess I spoke too soon. But why would I change back now, when I need to be a skeleton in order to see?

The Book reaches out impatiently. "I cannot control the transformation. It was in the armor's nature to change you back. We must light our path by other means. Give me your arm."

What do you mean? You don't have any hands.

"I said give it to me!"

I feel my left arm turn numb. An electrifying, searing heat spreads down from my shoulder to my palm, until the unbearable fever in my arm compels me to twist and contract the limb into an upright position. My palm is consumed in a white flash, which implodes into a violet fire.

I fixate upon my burning palm, and all I feel is fear. The Book can control the limbs of my body. It can make me harness the energy of the void, even though I've never cast a single spell in my life...

...unless I'm mistaken. What if I've already learned how to use magic, but I don't remember, because the Book has altered my memories? The Book was able to make me craft armor in my sleep; what else has it made me do?

"Now, now, Fristad. The flame you see before you is merely a light source. There is nothing to fear."

I feel the panic fade. The echo of the Book's words soothe me. It's right. I have nothing to fear. The Book is just trying to help me escape.

I scan my eyes across the room, now cast in a purple glow. It is roughly the same size as the room from which I came. The ceiling and walls are made of stone bricks, while the floor is covered with wood planks. There is only one way out, a corridor straight ahead.

My arm stings painfully with the heat of the void. I can't endure this fever much longer. I slide my axe into my empty sword sheathe, walk towards the wall, and lift a smoldering torch from its metal hold. I bring my burning palm towards the dying embers, but the violet flame flees backward like a flying snipe, away from the torch. The fever in my arm doesn't ebb at all, even though the flame is now suspended in the air beside me. I grimace with annoyance. What gives? I was trying to light a torch.

"Void fire does not behave the way you think it does, Fristad. If you were to light that torch with the flame in your hand, it would not burn steadily, but quickly disintegrate into nothingness. You must light the torch with flint and steel."

I sigh, drained by the persistent pain but eager to get rid of it. I set the torch down onto the ground, pull out my axe, and remove the flint rock from my back pocket with my sore left hand. I strike the blade upon the flint's edge, releasing a spark, which misses the torch entirely. I lean in closer and strike the flint again. The spark misses again, this time on the other side of the torch. I groan. Once more I strike the flint. The spark lands too low and scorches the wooden handle. Good riddance. Where will the spark land next? Above the torch?

My throbbing arm reminds me of its crisis. I don't care about accuracy at this point. I graze the flint back and forth against the blade, releasing a flurry of sparks above the torch. A flame finally catches on the tip of the ember. I drop to my knees as fast as I can and blow gently upon the baby flame, until the ember glows white. I tilt the torch upright and feel the pain in my arm weaken as the torchlight grows. Finally, a real flame!

I collect my flint into my pocket and my axe into my hand, then I grasp the torch and stand up. The heat of the torch-fire breathes against my face, reminding me of how my thick leather armor indiscriminately traps the heat near my skin. At least it will keep me safe from whatever monsters hide down here.

I walk forward into the only corridor, glancing cautiously at each shadow to verify that it stays still between the dips in the flickering light. I pray that one shadow does not split into two, revealing an animate figure which lunges at my heart. Despite my hunch, each wavering shadow remains its sole, fickle self: dark, intangible, and unknowable. I want to kill them, but I can't. At least I can kill a monster.

The corridor ends at a great passageway, as tall as it is wide. There is a gentle draft now. The air smells of putrefied feces and mildew. I bite my tongue as I fight my urge to gag. I stand still for a moment to take in my surroundings.

This place is a mess. There are great masses of trashed wood and unidentifiable, broken machines. Some of the stone columns are cut in half, hanging like stalactites from the ceiling while their lower halves are shattered and misplaced. Miniscule cracks in the ceiling project dim lines of light upon the drab brick walls.

Something is terribly wrong.

My spine tingles as I hear a faint creaking sound. Something is drawing a bow. I turn to the sound and see a figure clad in steel, with long, red hair hanging down from her helmet. The flint tip of her arrow gleams threateningly as she points it towards me, most likely at my neck.

"Don't shoot, don't shoot!" I raise my palms in front of my face.

"Why shouldn't I?" the woman steadies her bow for a better grip. "How do I know you aren't just saying that to lower my guard, so you can land the first strike?"

"I'm not a threat to you. How do I convince you of that? Can you be reasoned with?" I plead.

"Depends," she broods. "Are you a Nether looter?"

"No." I'm not even sure what a Nether looter is.

"Do you work for the government?"

"No."

"Is someone looking for you?"

"No," I lie.

"Do you owe anyone money?"

"No."

"Then I suppose I can be reasoned with. Explain to me why I shouldn't kill you."

"I'm only here because I'm lost and I don't want to kill you."

"Yea, right," the woman scoffs. "You aren't lost. No sane Minecraftian accidentally wanders into an abandoned city that's only accessible to the outside world through the Nether. Why are you really here?"

"If by 'lost,' you mean 'unable to find my way back,' then yes, I am very lost. What else do you expect me to say?"

"That's not the same as wandering into the Nether on accident. You are clearly here for a reason. What is it?"

"I... I don't know," I confess.

She doesn't respond. Her bow remains drawn.

The two of us stand still for an awkwardly long length of time. I don't want to move, because I'm afraid that she will fire her bow. At the same time, she might grow impatient and shoot me anyway, unless I say something to her... but I don't have a coherent story to tell her that isn't the truth. Maybe I could try saying something vague, and then she could help me fill in the gaps.

"There was a certain... occasion."

Gosh that sounds ridiculous. I really am a terrible liar.

"What sort of occasion?"

"I was at a party."

"Let me guess: you had a lapse of judgment and decided it might be fun to elope in the underworld?"

I shrug. "Pretty much."

"That makes absolutely no sense."

Notch smite it. She doesn't believe me.

I hear the bow creak. "I almost feel sorry for killing you."

The Book's voice rings loudly in my head. "I am tired of your terrible lies! I will not let you perish at the end of this stranger's arrow. It is time that we show the world what we are truly capable of. Look into her eyes, and tell her the words that you want her to believe."

The excruciating fever returns, stronger than before. This time, it permeates my entire body, but the fever is most strong within my head. My thoughts become restless. I lift my vision to the stranger's green eyes, which rest upon darkly freckled cheeks. I can almost swear I see fireflies behind her irises, shining like fleeting memories.

"I am not a threat to you," I insist. "You don't have to kill me."

The fireflies clump into a swarm and flit about wildly, as if agitated. What is going on? Is she thinking?

She continues to stand still, with her bow drawn. The fireflies disappear. The fever fades.

She lowers her bow and grins mischievously. "Why would I want to kill you? You're clearly not a threat to me."

"I thought you just said you wanted to kill me." Now I'm confused. Did I really influence her judgment, or was she joking?

"Well then, I must have had a... lapse of judgment." She winks.

"What about my crazy party story?"

"I'd rather not know the details. Keep it to yourself. Say, do you have a few minutes to spare? It's not every day that someone comes down here who doesn't have bizarre ulterior motives and doesn't have dangerous people following them."

"Sure, why not?"


	43. Chapter 42: The Perfect Experiment

I follow the armored bow-wielder into a small passage on the other side of the great, dilapidated passageway. The cavernous shadows pull back reluctantly from the light of my flickering torch.

I should have said no. I should have just left the woman alone, but there was just too much to gain. She could have food... or supplies... or knowledge of how to get out of this place. There is another reason why I want to follow her, but I don't know how to describe it. Somehow, the sight of the fireflies in her eyes was... beautiful. I want to see the glowing creatures again, to watch them flit around, to watch them coalesce with each utterance that slides from my tongue...

I just hope that those fireflies aren't what I think they are.

I want so much to believe that my newfound power isn't real. If I let it sink in that I am capable of controlling minds, I know that knowledge will change me.

...for the better.

A tiny voice echoes inside of me, a piece of my consciousness I have tried so hard to suppress over the many years of my life. It cries for freedom, for happiness, for greatness. It wants me to climb above the mundane, crowded rat's nest that is humanity. It offers me the missing piece of truth that I have always yearned for.

...but I know it's wrong. Why would I ever think those things?

"Here we go," the girl announces as she pushes aside a wooden pallet, revealing a dreamy red glow beneath the shadows. She walks inside.

I follow her into the same passageway... or should I say room. What is this place? There are flaming furnaces along the wall... and chests and workbenches... and what is that rolled-up sack hanging on the back wall, with fabric draped over it? Is that a sleeping bag?

"Is there a problem?" She asks, looking back at me.

"No, I'm fine."

"You seem a bit surprised at my standard of living."

"That's not at all what I was thinking... wait, you actually live down here?"

"I guess you wouldn't expect that, since it's underground and it smells like sewage," she notes in a relatively monotone voice.

"Sorry, I didn't mean to offend you. I was just–"

"It's fine. I can tell you're not from around here."

That stung. I don't like being called a clueless foreigner.

The Book interrupts my stream of thought, "Fristad, focus! Do you realize the gravity of this situation? Every second you wear that enchanted armor, Dan comes closer to finding you. The armor must be destroyed."

Are you crazy? I can't destroy this armor; it is irreplaceable! There has to be some other way...

"The alternative is that Dan finds you and imprisons you, so that he may torment you with his spells as he pleases. Surely you do not want this?"

I can't let him do that again. I've already tried so hard to escape... but I don't want to burn in the sunlight, either.

"Hey, would you mind turning over some coals in the furnace right next to you?" The girl asks as she reaches into a live furnace with her blade.

"Umm... no problem," I reply, groggy and half-aware.

"What perfect timing," the Book remarks. "You can dispose of your armor in the furnace."

There's no way I'm going to do that.

"You must do it."

The heat of the furnace nips threateningly at my approaching hand. I turn the furnace door's rusted knob, and the door swings open, revealing white-tongued flames dancing among glowing coals. On the shelf above them is an orange-tinged, molten metal, thick like magma, its shape jittering beneath the smoke.

I turn towards the black stake hanging on the back wall. I lift my foot, but I feel my body hesitate. An urgent need floods my muscles. A familiar sensation overcomes me, the restlessness of a waking dream. I recall standing in front of the crafting bench, watching the bone and leather coalesce into boots. I hated crafting that armor, but then I learned to love it. Now the Book is taking it away from me.

I feel hard stone beneath my sweaty feet. I watch my beloved boots curl and blacken within the flames. My fingers crawl underneath the straps of my helmet. My arms release it like a catapult. Next goes the chestpiece...

"What in the Nether are you doing?" The girl kicks the furnace shut and stands in front of me. "That was perfectly good armor."

"Exactly!"

"If you knew it was so valuable, then why did you burn it?"

"I don't know..." or maybe I do. Somehow my mind feels clearer now, as if some draining influence on my mind has been lifted. "Actually, I think the armor may have been cursed."

"What do you mean, 'cursed'?"

"Cursed like in that one story... I forget what it's called. Thieves keep sneaking into a dungeon to find some priceless amulet, but none of them make it out alive."

"I don't know what that story is, but I'm pretty sure your armor isn't cursed. Look, if you really don't want your armor, can you at least let me have what's left of it?"

"Trust me, you don't want this armor," I insist.

"Why not? It's enchanted, right?"

"Well, the problem with the enchantment is that..." I cut myself short. I can't tell her about the skeleton transformation, or she might want to kill me again.

"What enchantment is it?" Her brow furrows with worry.

"Knockback."

An awkward minute of silence passes. Then the girl's eyes widen.

"Okay, I don't want it," she mutters rapidly. She steps aside. "If it's really cursed, then you should get rid of it. I'm sorry; I have trust issues."

"I've noticed."

I swing open the furnace door and throw my chestpiece onto the hot coals. Gosh, am I glad to be rid of that stuffy armor. I unstrap my leg armor and throw it on top of the chestpiece. The mass of leather and bone shrinks and blackens as the fire consumes them. Then, out of nowhere, white smoke rises up from beneath the coals, and the blackened mass sinks into it just like a slain mob sinks into the earth.

I lift my brows in surprise. "I did not expect that." That was a bit creepy.

"Expect what? What happened?"

"The armor disappeared in a cloud of white smoke. It's completely gone. See for yourself." I step back.

The armored girl kneels down in front of the furnace and peers inside. "Yeeep. Definitely cursed." She sifts through the coals with her sword. "Where the heck did it goo...? Ooooo..." She makes spooky ghost sounds.

"Hopefully into the void, where it will never be seen again."

"No, it most likely went into the Red Aether."

"What's that?"

"It's the place where dead things go. It's also the place where miners store all of their junk."

"That's interesting. I wonder why I've never heard of it before."

The girl swings the furnace closed. "That's because you're not a miner." She smirks, leaning against the furnace as she sits down.

"And I'm guessing you are a miner?"

"Ex-miner," she corrects me.

"Why aren't you a miner anymore?"

She crosses her arms and legs. "I'm not much of a miner without my crew. Most of my crew died in a cave-in three years back. After that, everyone moved on. It just wasn't the same."

"That's awful. I'm sorry."

"Don't be. They were miners, after all. They respawned with their memories intact... well, almost."

"Why then did everyone leave if they still had their memories?"

"It was a huge setback. We lost a lot of resources. It wasn't the first time we had a cave-in, either. Zomem's ancient tunnels are so unstable. Even the deepest caves can feel the strain of their collapse. At some point, everyone decided the payout wasn't worth it."

"Why did you stay, then?"

"There has to be something in these ruins worth searching for. Priceless artifacts, maybe. The best part is that if I find them, I don't have to share the profits."

"So you work alone?"

"You bet."

She's... alone. She's vulnerable. I could influence her to do my bidding, and no one would be the wiser. Sure, she's a miner, but even a miner couldn't resist the silver fire of the void. It's the perfect experiment.


	44. Chapter 43: Stupid Decisions

After another moment of silence, the girl stands up abruptly. "Well, that was fun. It's been a while since I've told a good story. I have stuff to do, though, so if you don't mind..."

"Wait, hold on! You've just told me a story about your life, but I don't even know your name."

"Umm..." she hesitates, "Brittany."

"Brittany..." I taste the name on my tongue. Does the knowledge of her name give me power over her, or will it make me more self-conscious about controlling her?

"And you are...?"

"Colby," I respond quickly.

"Nice to meet you, Colby. Look, I'd love to talk more, but I've got things to do, so if it's alright with you..."

"Wait! I need you to do me a favor." A warmth inside me begins to rise. Fleeting, glowing dots begin to shine through Brittany's eyes. I need to start with something small, something harmless. "I need you to sit down."

"What... why?" Brittany says as she sits down, her eyes squinting with confusion.

So far so good. "Now stand on your knees."

She leans forward and stands on her knees.

"Now stand on one foot."

She stands up and lifts her left shin into her hand. Her facial expression becomes relaxed, as if in deep thought.

"Now jump five times."

She jumps on one foot. Her metal armor clanks loudly from the impact.

I burst out laughing.

The Book projects impatience. "Fristad, that's enough. You have confirmed that you are able to control her, but now you need to prepare yourself for the journey."

Are you kidding? The best part of having power is making stupid decisions, without any consequences. Let me have my laugh!

"Great," I say, "Now sing the Standard Alphabet."

"Eee, Oh, Ah; Iye, Ooo, Uy; Wu, Ur, El; En, Em, Na. Aych, Jay, Fay, Say, Vay. Po, Bo; Ga, Da. Ze, Qway, Kay and lastly Tay," Brittany recites as she stands on one foot.

The fireflies in her eyes swarm about wildly, fading in and out of existence. I wonder if there's a way for me to see them more clearly, so I can understand what they mean. I fixate upon them. The fever grows, and the depth of the swarm expands farther into her irises, like a mysterious mirror dimension. I begin to see vine-like patterns in the growing swarm.

"Now sing it again, this time while hopping on one foot," I command.

Brittney hops on one foot while singing.

Hold on... why am I doing this? And what is with that man's eyes? They're glowing! My heart skips a beat as I avert my gaze. Those weren't my thoughts.

The Book becomes nervous. "Something's wrong. Only a few minutes have passed, and yet she's already starting to question our authority. You need to hide your influence. Ask her why she's acting strangely and tell her you saw a flash of light coming from the furnace. Then, without using magic, ask her for as much supplies as you can, and leave this place for good."

Got it. "Woah, did you see that flash of light coming from the furnace that's right behind you? Also, what in Notch's name are you doing?" I ask.

Brittany puts her foot down, and her eyes widen. The fireflies fade away. "I did! I saw the light reflecting in your eyes. Weird, huh?" She stares down at the furnace behind her. "The fumes from the cursed armor must be making me looney. Maybe I should take a break from smelting for a while."

The Book observes with approval. "Wonderful job."

Thanks. I thought the expletive was a nice touch.

"Sounds like a good idea..." I say to Brittany, about to change the subject. "Look, I don't want to take away from your time, but I really do need supplies if I'm going to make it out of here alive."

"How long did it take you to get in here?" Brittany raises an eyebrow.

"A few days," I lie, hoping it would allow me to get extra supplies.

She leans her head back and emits a boisterous laugh. "What convoluted passage did you take? I know Nether passages that could get you out in a few hours! But I will humor you. What do you want?"

"Some food, some water, an iron sword, and some armor."

"Food and water I can give you, although I'm afraid I don't have much iron to spare. I'll tell you what: help me craft and run the furnaces for the next few days, and I'll make you a sword and some passable armor. Deal?"

"Deal," I reply.

Brittany holds out her arm, and we shake hands.

-

I stretch my sore knees onto Brittany's spare blankets, sweaty and exhausted from the day's work. Most of the exertion came from bending over and kindling furnaces, but a surprising amount came from crafting. As I've recently learned, crafting recipes do actually have a small energy cost associated with them, but it's only noticeable if you craft a lot of things at once. Crafting all those tools and buckets made my wrists feel numb.

The roaring furnace fires have reduced to a subtle glow. Brittany lays within her sleeping bag, inspecting a glowing redstone gem in her hand, as wide as the bridge of her thumb is thick. Her bow, quiver, and sword lay behind her. To her side lie two deep wooden bowls stacked together, emptied of mushroom soup. I could barely empty one.

"Brittany, do you mind if I ask you one last question?" I ask.

"Sure."

"Why aren't there any monsters down here, even though it's so dark?"

"What are you talking about? Of course there are monsters down here. I'm surprised you haven't seen any."

"Oh..." I reply.

I hold my breath for a moment and listen for the sound of footsteps, but I don't hear any. If there really are monsters out there, that would mean that the only thing separating them from our bedsides is that thin wooden pallet at the end of the room.

"Do you mind if I ask you one last question?" Brittany adds.

"Fine with me."

"Is there something bothering you?"

"What do you mean?"

Brittany presses her elbow against the ground and rests her head on her hand. "There's something in your eyes. Somehow, when I look at them, they make me feel nervous."

"I wouldn't say I feel nervous, if that's what you mean."

I turn over onto my side and pull the blankets over me. Sleeping on this hard stone floor isn't so comfortable, but it's better than standing.

"Good night," I yawn.

"Good night, Colby."

If I wasn't so tired, I would have asked Brittany a lot more questions.

I close my eyes and feel the tiredness of my limbs drag my mind into dark clouds. Even the hard ground cannot stave off my sleep. I begin to feel my senses fading, but one stray question jolts my mind awake.

What did Brittany see in my eyes?


	45. Chapter 44: Encounter

A painful pressure on my chest pulls me abruptly out of sleep. A cold, snuffling nose brushes against my cheek. A tongue presses eagerly against my face, coating it in sticky, filthy slobber. I try to sit up, but another leg pushes against my chest. I turn my head to the side and try to cover my face with my arm. The dog proceeds to thoroughly lick the inside of my ear. I push its muzzle away.

Footsteps echo from the hallway. A harsh light illuminates the dark room, scorching my eyes. A sleeping bag shuffles. A bow creaks.

Before Jonas finishes saying "Thank Notch," I hear the snap of a launched arrow.

The dog jumps off of me and starts to growl. I hear a bone-crushing thump. The dog squeals.

I sit up.

"Stay down! Let me handle this!" orders Brittany. She pulls back her bow. Another arrow wizzes off. Jonas cries out.

The light begins to fade. I turn towards the doorway and see the tail of Jonas' brown cloak disappear behind the wall. Brittany sprints toward the doorway.

"Stop, please! He's my friend," I cry as I spring off the ground and onto my toes.

Brittany halts at the corner of the wall. She holds her sword ready. Her other hand clutches arrows and a bow. "You must be joking."

"I'm serious!"

She turns her head toward me and stares me down with squinted eyes. "I thought you said nobody was following you."

"This wasn't supposed to happen."

Brittany lets out a deep sigh. "Go talk some sense into the halfblood so he doesn't come back and try to kill me."

I nod and run into the hallway. I follow the fading light around a corner. "Jonas, it's okay! I told her you aren't a threat."

Jonas' cloak settles as he halts his run. He turns around, revealing an arrow lodged beneath his cloak, clinging to the center of his chest. His right jaw oozes blood. He bends over, sets down a yellow-glowing lantern onto the ground, and yanks out the arrow from his chest. He drops the arrow onto the floor. Silver metal glints faintly from beneath the collar of his cloak. "She's certainly a threat to me."

"Oh Notch, she could have killed you!" I cry out, seeing how accurately the arrows struck.

"I thought you were dead..." Jonas chokes up. "What were you thinking, running into the Nether like that?"

"The Book made me do it." I pick up the arrow on the ground and brush its tip with the flesh of my thumb. It's still sharp. I feel the Book watching... hoping... wanting... "It wanted me to escape. It made me burn my armor, too, just so Dan couldn't find me."

"It made you get rid of your only defense..." Jonas shakes his head. "This is the second time the book has put your life at risk. What was I thinking? I was so selfish. I should have used my powers to help you."

"It's been a long day." I lean forward and spread my arms for a hug.

We embrace each other and pat each other on the back.

I clench the arrow tight and aim it at Jonas' neck. Jonas grabs my wrist and tries to push it away. Our arms are in deadlock.

Jonas' violet irises look deep into mine. "Fristad would never do this."

The more I stare into his eyes, the more alien they become. I feel myself pressing harder, augmented with growing hatred. "I would never kill Jonas, but you... you are a monster."

The light suddenly switches off. I realize I've lost control. A terrible heat submerges me. I try to pierce through it, to try to stop the Book from killing my best friend.

"Don't kill Jonas!" I cry out. The light fades back in. I drop the arrow and run backwards. I pull the axe from my belt and the Book from my back pocket. I have to destroy the Book, no matter what it takes.

"Please do not kill me," the Book pleads. "I am a better friend than Jonas will ever be. How can you trust Jonas over me when Jonas lied to you? He even admitted he was selfish. When given a choice between helping you and helping himself, he helped himself! Is that the kind of friend that you want to keep?"

I refuse to listen to you any longer. I throw the Book down, lift the axe above my head, and swing down upon the binding of the Book. A sharp pain slices through my abdomen. I feel the urge to cry out in pain, but my voice is silent. The light shivers and distorts until I am drifting in a sea of bubbles. The world twists again, and I see a humanoid figure standing in front of me, its form covered with pages of text. Its arm holds an axe whose blade is embedded into my gut. The figure places its palm gently upon my chest.

I feel my memories begin to break apart. I try to bring together the pieces, but I am drowning in them...


	46. Chapter 45: Kenneth

"Fall 12th, 1553, Age of Redstone," I recite, watching the teacher inscribe the date into a new page of my drill book.

"There you are, sweetheart: the date written proper. Do you know what to do next?"

"Yes," I reply. I look at the schoolbook to my left. "I am on page 67."

"Wonderful!" the teacher replies, "Just remember that it's a new year... that means new responsibility! From now on, you have to write the name AND date on all of your drills. Do you understand?"

"Yes, ma'am."

I did not quite understand why Miss Fireheart wanted me to write such useless information on every single drill. If I were the teacher, I would not make my students write such useless information. Sadly, however, I am not an adult, so I don't have that kind of authority. Adults make kids do things. Such is the way of the world.

There is, however, one adult, whom I have recently met, who seemed to treat me differently than all the others. His name is Kenneth Forthright. I will meet him in the oak grove behind the schoolhouse this afternoon.

-

I sit with my back against the sturdy bark of an oak, my dark hair warmed gently by the heat of the waning Fall sun. A breeze breathes softly through my blouse, giving my chest a chill.

I feel a light tap on my shoulder, and I feel slightly annoyed. Why can't my friends just leave me alone right now?

I turn around slowly and see Kenneth leaning against the tree, and my annoyance fades.

He eyes me thoughtfully, with a rugged grin. Between his fingers is a five credit bullion, its bronze sheen flashing against the angled sun. He flicks it into the air and holds his palm out. The coin halts its fall just above his palm, spinning rapidly as it bobs slightly up and down. Then the coin suddenly stops spinning, and then slowly spins the other way, before finally dropping into his hand, his fingers grasping them in the same manner as before.

My jaw drops. "That's a neat trick," I note with admiration.

Kenneth winks. "Perhaps I will show you some time." He slides the coin into a burlap pocket. "Do your parents know you're here with me?"

"No."

"Good. I wouldn't want them to worry about you. They do worry about you, you know."

"You are starting to sound like Miss Fireheart."

"Who's Miss Fireheart?"

"She is my schoolteacher."

"I see your point, but... Miss Fireheart doesn't keep secrets." His eyes gleam with adventure.

I feel a sense of foreboding, as if something horrible could happen, but there is something about this man that intrigues me. I want to know what it is, but I know that I cannot. What have I gotten myself into? My parents are going to be so angry when they find out where I am. I should have gone straight home the moment school ended...

"There is something about you which intrigues me as well. That is why I am here."

I feel my guilt fade slightly. It is as if Kenneth could read my mind. I feel understood... appreciated.

"Iris, do you trust me?" Kenneth turns to face me. His burgundy eyes bore deep into my own.

I look away to avoid the weight of his stare. "I am not sure that I do..."

"Are you afraid of me?"

I hesitate for a moment. "A little bit."

"Then why are you here?" Kenneth counters, a hint of anger creeping into his voice.

"Because you told me to come here," I reply.

"Let me give you a better reason." Kenneth holds out his hand. "I am giving you a choice. You can come with me, and I can show you what you are capable of, or you can go home, and never see me again."

"Why do I have to choose now?"

"I don't trust you enough to keep my existence a secret forever. I guess I would say that the lack of trust is..." Kenneth sighs, "mutual."

I nod, beginning to understand.

-

I follow Kenneth out of my home town and onto a trail on the open plains. Light turns to sunset, and sunset turns to dusk. At first I am excited, but then I begin to think about my parents... and my school... and my friends. I realize I have made a huge mistake following a strange man I hardly know.

"I don't want to follow you anymore. I want to go home," I tell him.

"It's too late now. You should have gone home when you had the chance."

"When can I go home?" I ask.

"I'm sorry, but you won't be able to go home for a while." Kenneth is starting to treat me like a child. His voice has become more bitter. "Stay close to me. It's for your own good."

We soon arrive at another town. Orange, flickering lights glow from building windows. We pass two guards which nod in unison.

"Welcome back," the guard on the left greets us.

On the opposite side of the guards is a sign that reads, "Britwal: The City of Light"

-

Who am I? Iris... or Fristad? I don't remember anymore.

I feel disoriented and lost. Pages have begun to cling to me like parasites. My arm is stiff as I try to reach for my side, peeling away a page painfully, like an underdeveloped scab.

I slowly raise the page up to my face. The page is full of rips and holes. The letters visible on the page are jumbled, forming neither words nor lines. I have to find meaning in those letters. I have to fix the broken memories, before they consume me.

My memories of Kenneth Forthright are few, but I know for certain that he was a madman. There can't possibly be an ounce of good in him. He brought me to the Britwal Tavern, where he hurt that miner. Whenever I tried to escape, he found me and took me back... or was that all just a dream?

More pages cling to me. I feel myself fading. My thoughts drift to pages, to lexical structures, to the void.

I hear a deep, metallic voice. It's hard to hear what it says because it's so faint. I only make out the tail end of it.

"You're going to be okay."


	47. Chapter 46: Apprenticeship

It is deadly quiet. The trees are perfectly still. The cliff walls, hiding behind the fallen underbrush, resist even the smallest echo. The sky is still. Time is still.

The air is thin now, too fickle to make me feel hot or cold. A cabin nestles against the cliffside brush. Kenneth looks at the cabin, and then looks at me. His face is calm, dignified.

We approach the cabin door, twigs cracking under our shoes. Above the firm oak door is a small stained-glass window. Its colored tiles are muted by the sunlight, reduced to a formless web of shapes.

Kenneth steps in front of me and opens the door, which gives way silently. I step inside. The air smells faintly of oil and wood shavings. To my left is a tan coat hanger, on which hangs a robe and a pair of thin-soled slippers. Underneath my feet is a grey wolf pelt.

The door clicks closed behind me. I hear a deep sigh.

"Finally, we're alone! Ha ha." Kenneth laughs awkwardly.

I feel his hand on my shoulder. I turn to face him.

"Iris, surely you know, at this point, why it is that I brought you here?" Kenneth is crouching, facing me eye-to-eye.

The question hangs in the air.

"Come on, spit it out."

"You want me... to become your apprentice," I answer softly.

"Right you are!" He lifts his hand off my shoulder and onto his knee. "You see: this is why I knew you were the one. With any other child your age, my hinting would be way over their head... or they'd think it's some stupid game." Kenneth's lips widen into a grin. "Of course... learning to use one's life force to manipulate matter is far from a game. Take your shoes off and I'll show you around."

My heart beats faster as I tear off my shoes. I follow Kenneth through the coatroom corridor and into a stately living room. To the left, richly upholstered chairs face a brick fireplace, lightly coated with ash. A plush, white fur rug covers the open floor. At a table with chairs to the right sits an unfolded map, a protractor, a compass, a stack of papers and a flint pen with a honing stone. On the opposite wall is a bookcase with a collection of books, more stacks of folded papers, drawers, and small crates. The top two shelves are nearly empty. A chandelier hangs from the ceiling...

I look to my left and notice Kenneth leaving through a door, not bothering to wait for me. I run to catch up.

The next room looks not unlike a kitchen. There are furnaces, pots, buckets, cabinets... but on the upper shelves are more unusual things: a surplus of thick books, jars of powder, sealed pouches, and many sizes of empty glass flasks...

At this room, too, Kenneth does not stop to explain the surroundings. I reluctantly continue to follow him.

We reach a metal door with neither a knob nor a handle. Kenneth places his palm upon its center. A moment passes, and then I hear a click. The door swings open on its own.

We enter a third room, which looks partly like a library, partly like an emporium, and partly like an armory. Kenneth's fingers stretch out, brushing the metal blades, bows, and twisted staffs which hang against one side of a bookshelf. He then licks a finger and slides it along a series of books, pausing to pull out a green-bound tome with gilded script, titled "Focus and M.A.N.A.: Volume II."

"This is where, you could say, all the magic happens." Kenneth lays the book upon a podium and opens the cover. He flips through the pages one by one until, finding something, he pokes his finger through the thick of the tome and spreads the pages flat.

Kenneth reads for a few minutes, then closes his eyes. His face relaxes. His breathing deepens.

A current of warmth makes me stiffen instinctively. An inescapable feeling convinces me that something big is about to happen. I feel a distinct presence begin to grow. I reach for it, but it falls out of my grasp like the falling step on a Jacob's Ladder. My eyes focus on Kenneth. He is at the center of this strange presence.

Kenneth's eyes open and focus upon me. His eyes now glow silver. He raises his hands with a smirk. I feel a faint rumble.

A sliver of violet light appears in front of Kenneth. It spreads around him as it widens, its center becoming whiter and paler. Light begins to bend around its edges, its immediate surroundings deprived of color. It is half a meter tall now. Stars appear in its grey center and spread outward. The purple at its edges grows thinner as a grey haze spreads out from the source. The strange form is now over a meter wide in every direction.

I knew this man was more than just a stage magician.

Kenneth's breath itself echoes from the walls as he inhales to speak. "I am a mage of void." His voice booms with energy. "I study the flames which rage beneath the bedrock, whose billows formed the rifts of the Farlands. I practice the magic of forgotten memories and forbidden worlds. This hole you see is a rift into the deep void, the stuff which flows between other worlds." He plunges his hand into the starry grey cloud. His crazed silver eyes flicker and then glow even brighter. "I coexist with the element of destruction, the substance in which even the soul dissolves. What could tear my flesh from bone has instead made me stronger. What could steal all my knowledge has instead made me wiser. What could destroy my being has instead defined my very existence. Void fire is as much a part of me as the blood which flows through my veins!"

He pulls his hand out. The rift collapses with a sharp crack. Kenneth's eyes, still fixed upon me, lose their silver glow. "Iris, the void is not for weak minds. If given the chance, it will burn every part of you. Given enough time, it will break into your mind, destroying what you know and believe, and you will then feel the distinct pain of nothingness. However, if you befriend the void, you will gain access to its ever-burning flame, you will gain its deep connection with knowledge and the mind, and you can use its energy as if it were your own. If you become my apprentice, I will teach you everything I know about magic and the void. Do you accept?"

"I accept." I respond immediately, both blessing and loathing my decision. The danger feels so real... but so does the power. The intrigue of magic, the glorious stories of mages I've read in books, the hope of harnessing such energy as my own... all are too much to resist.

"Wonderful... although I must admit that I am not surprised at all. You always try to hide your excitement about magic, but I know your feelings are greater than they appear. You becoming my apprentice was inevitable."

"And yet you had to drag this process on, just to make sure." I smile.

"For a while, yes, but let us not forget that you also had cold feet, worrying what your life would be like without your parents and your friends. I was beginning to doubt you could handle the change, but then my doubts were proven wrong." Kenneth closes the book and puts it away.

There he goes about my parents and my friends again. Why does he have to keep reminding me of them? It just makes it harder for me to not miss them, when I really should be focusing on magic right now...

How long am I going to be away from home?

"Jeez, I got carried away," Kenneth admits. "I guess I'm just so enamored with void magic that I had to share it with you, you being my new apprentice and all. Let's get on with the tour, then."

We leave the magic room. The metal door closes behind us. Kenneth leads me past the kitchen and across from the living room to the side with the bookshelves. We enter a room which is rather empty for its size, having only a twin bed with a nightstand and a dresser across from it. The mattress is bare, with neatly folded bed sheets stacked on top of it. Light streams in calmly from a small window next to the bed. The air smells fresh.

"This is where you will sleep," Kenneth says. "It's a work-in-progress, since I've moved into this house quite recently."

The reality of my new home sinks in. I imagine laying under the covers of the bed at night, casting magic light spells to make shadow puppets.

"Now I'll show you my room."

Kenneth leads me across the living room and into a study, complete with a tilted desk and a haphazardly filled bookshelf. Beyond this room is a half-closed door. Through it I can see a sofa next to curtained windows. Kenneth opens the door, revealing a grand draped bed with a nightstand on one side and a chest in front. To its left are a pair of dressers and a fur rug.

"I just thought I'd let you see it so as to satisfy your curiosity. As a general rule, however, you are not allowed inside, and you shall not disturb me. If the matter is urgent, you must knock, but you must not, under any circumstances, enter. The same rule applies to the study we are standing in. Do I make myself clear?"

I nod.


	48. Chapter 47: Beginning of Instruction

Kenneth closes the door to his study behind us.

"I'm glad we've gotten that little formality out of the way, haha," Kenneth laughs awkwardly again. "Aren't you? Man, do I hate being the bad guy, but that's one of the few things I have to ask of you... aside from what your training requires, of course..."

Kenneth's voice slows. He gazes blankly for a moment, as if absorbed in thought... and then he smiles at me. "Speaking of your training, how would you like to practice a basic spell or two? You can read, right?"

"Of course I can read," I respond, slightly annoyed. I'm not a three-year-old, after all.

"Great! Follow me so I can get you a book."

Kenneth leads me across the house, beyond the door without a knob. We walk behind the bookshelf behind the podium, the same podium where Kenneth cast the void rift spell. There are mostly books on the following shelves. A wall clock painted with the sun and moon rests on its side behind some books.

Kenneth scans the shelves for a while. His brow narrows with confusion. "I need to re-organize these. Aha, found it!" He reaches up toward a higher shelf and pulls out a worn, brown book. He hands it to me.

It is much thinner than most of the tomes I have seen so far, but its weight is enough to make me feel giddy. This is where it all begins, isn't it? Will learning magic for the first time change how I perceive myself? I turn the book over to read the title:

"Elementary Telekinetics"

"This is an instructional book, if I remember correctly," Kenneth notes, "so it should go over the basics of spell mechanics and magic safety and the like. Just be sure to read it carefully starting from the first page, and don't skip anything."

I open the book and turn over the first few pages until I reach a page titled "Introduction."

"Ah, there's no need to strain yourself reading that book while standing. You can read it at the table in the living room. Come on, I insist!"

I feel Kenneth's hand push gently against my back. My sense of excitement fades into... awkwardness. The light pressure of his hand guides me around the bookshelves, past the handle-less metal door, through the kitchen, and leftward towards the table in the living room, where the same map lays unfolded as before. I feel the pressure of Kenneth's hand finally lift from my back. Kenneth walks forward and pushes the stack of papers to the other side of the table; then brushes aside the map, compass, and writing utensils. He pulls out a chair from the table.

Was it really necessary for Kenneth to lead me all the way to this desk? No, of course not. I am perfectly capable of seating myself.

"There, that should do it. I'd say sitting at a desk is a far more productive way to study, wouldn't you agree? Now, if you excuse me, I must go sit at my own desk, in my own private study. If you need something from me, remember to knock."

I nod, and watch Kenneth walk away with his hands clasped behind his back. His posture emanates a profound sense of purpose, restoring my awe for him once more. I watch him open the door and disappear behind it. The door thuds softly shut against the wood frame.

It is as if the moment Kenneth faded from my vision, he faded from existence as well. Whatever arcane texts he pores over are now a mystery to me, as long as they are separated by that forbidden door. Will there ever come a day when I too will pore over magical texts as arcane and obscure as his? Will there ever come a day when I too will stand at a podium, just like Kenneth did a few minutes ago, and spawn a void rift on a whim?

I really hope so.

I place my open spellbook onto the table and sit down. My eyes land upon the first line:

-

Introduction

You are most likely reading this spellbook as one of your first instructional textbooks. If so, then it is with great honor that we, the authors of this spellbook, welcome you to the world of magic. As with all introductory magic books, we begin first with a brief history of magic.

No one knows who were the first humans to practice magic. Estimates of its origins range from 2000 Primordial to 1859 Diamond. The earliest evidence comes from stone tablets excavated from the Valley of the Celestial Craters, a region of badlands in Inner Minecraftia which is also where the first evidence of mining is found. The tablets, dated between 2000 Primordial and 300 Iron, record a ritual where animals and incense were burnt as tribute to a humanoid deity with the head of a boar. The systematic manner in which the ritual was prepared implied knowledge of the innate energies of different materials, and the incantations used closely resemble known fire spells. However, many mages have attempted to replicate these rituals yet have failed to evoke any magic spell. It is still disputed whether these rituals involved magic that is simply inaccessible to us.

Later archeological evidence of magic use comes from sites of iron automata, or 'golems,' unearthed in the Muse Forests, which border the Farlands on the eastern frontier. While the golems are now no more useful than hollow scrap metal, there is clear evidence of wear at their joints, and traces of life magic still emanate from within them. This residual magic has allowed mages to date their 'deaths' between 200 and 800 Iron. It is uncertain how these golems were created, as there is no known earth spell which can infuse life into a hollow metal body. One theory states that a now-forgotten strain of earth magic was developed to improve the quality of life for the people of the Muse Forests, which would later lead to the creation of the golems and the westward dissemination of magic. However, this contradicts some theories modeling the spread of magic; these theories suggest that the adoption of magic in distant regions occurred too soon for the knowledge of "Musite" magic to reach them. It is also uncertain whether humans were responsible for creating the golems in the first place, given the fact that the technology used to create them never spread westward.

As these two pieces of historical evidence illustrate, the origins of the human practice of magic are shrouded in mystery. Signs of human magic use have been dated widely throughout the Age of Iron, although they are as heavily disputed by scholars as the religious rituals and Musite golems which came before them. However, taken as a body of evidence, it is almost certain that humans practiced magic at some point during the Age of Iron. It is also widely believed that the first mages, whenever they lived, practiced magic in secret, since magic had been condemned by society as demon worship up until near the end of the Age of Iron.

A recorded event which puts a decisive upper bound on the discovery of magic appears in the book "The Intelligent Nature of Wind and Tempests" written by Heidi Marcson in 1859 Diamond. The book is still studied by wind mages to this day. It is prefaced with a record of Marcson's meeting in the royal court of King Gino I, where Marcson first recounted her discoveries of how summon and control the wind. The preface of the book ends with the king's signature, and the original copy contains Gino's seal of approval, a symbol of the Minecraftian government's acceptance of Marcson's findings as valid academic research, and furthermore, an acceptance of magic by members of the aristocracy.

King Gino's endorsement would prove to be a boon for the study of magic, which would spread greatly throughout the Age of Diamond. Only two decades after Heidi Marcson published her book on wind magic, Maccoy Rexerthos published his famous work "Organization and Methods for the Study of Magic." You may already be familiar with Rexerthos' classification of magic into four primary elements: Earth, Water, Air, and Fire. Rexerthos is considered a pioneer in the institutionalization of magic. Many of the major schools of magic would form based on the educational system which he developed, each assigned its own pantheon of patron deities based on Rexerthos' elemental classification. You may recognize some of the the common deities associated with earth magic: Stephine, Herobrine, Garrus, and Mallus. There are patron deities associated with the schools of Fire, Water, and Air magic as well, in addition to a few more specialized schools, such as the school of Life magic. As you will discover in more advanced spellbooks, some elemental spells must call upon the name of one or more of their respective patron gods. Rexerthos' choices for primary elements and patron gods were no coincidence; his works synthesized from the body of knowledge and belief systems which existed at that time. Many of those belief systems have persisted to this day.

As we have mentioned, Maccoy Rexerthos was responsible for developing an elemental theory of magic. This theory, at its core, divides magic into four basic elements, and states that all forms of magic are combinations of those four elements. However, as with any theory, Rexerthos' elemental theory is limited, and thus other theories began to develop throughout the Age of Diamond.

One such theory is the Theory of Inverse Suppression, proposed by the Council of the School of Earth Magic in 554 Diamond. This theory instead classifies magic along a continuum of characteristics, such as the origin and the density of the material manipulated. The basis of the theory is that the farther away two forms of magic are on the continuum, the less compatible they are. The theory is particularly well-suited to explain why a mage cannot practice two seemingly opposite forms of magic, such as Fire magic and Water magic.

Another alternative theory is the Object-Agent Theory, developed in 3518 Diamond by Hal Shadesmith and Emelon Neildon. It draws some inspiration from the way that magicians used to think about magic before it became heavily institutionalized, such as the work of earlier well-known scholars like Heidi Marcson. The earlier way of thinking about magic associated levels of soul-like consciousness to all things; from people, to animals, to manmade tools, to forces of nature. This idea of magic was criticized as mysticism, and rightfully so as the system was weighed down with religious bias. However, there was some truth to the system, as it could predict how the effect of a spell cast on a human could differ from the effect of the same spell cast on an animal. The idea as refined by Shadesmith and Neildon states that the effect of a spell is determined by a combination of intelligence and magic susceptibility, due to the fact that a spell conveys both information and energy. Much of this textbook draws from this theory, as you will see in the first chapter.

-

I lift my head from the final line of the page and take a deep breath. That was definitely not like the textbooks my teacher makes me read at school. Those were dull by comparison. It reminds me of my parent's books; the sentences are longer and far more interesting, although there are some words in it that I could not understand, like "implied" and "theory." Maybe I can ask Kenneth what they mean...

I draw my eyes to the left, to the closed door on the other side of the living room.

I would ask him, but he said he did not want to be disturbed in his study. But surely Kenneth would make an exception for the sake of my studies?

I stand up from my chair and walk to the door.

I remember now. Kenneth said it was fine if I knock first.

I rap my knuckles against the door.

"Just a minute..." I hear Kenneth's muffled voice from the inside.

The door opens with Kenneth's brown eyes peeking out.

"What do you want?" he asks in a slightly annoyed, monotone voice.

"What do 'implied' and 'theory' mean?"

"'Implied' means 'logically connected to something.' A 'theory' is an idea that is good at explaining things." Kenneth partially closes the door, leaving only half of his face visible. "Anything else?"

"I think I understand what they mean a little better..." Maybe they would make sense better in context. "Hold on, let me get the textbook."


	49. Chapter 48: A Test of Aptitude

"So Iris... how far did you get in the spellbook?" Kenneth asks me before he bites the unidentified piece of meat off of his fork.

We are seated at the same table in the living room where I was studying earlier. Kenneth is seated at one end of the table, me at the other. The table has been cleared of everything but our dinner meals, making the wooden surface between us appear barren and long.

"I am most of the way through the the third chapter," I respond.

I rest my elbow upon my chair's arm and my chin upon my hand, tired from the long day spent traveling and then studying. The chunk of meat on my plate is an odd color. It is some shade of light brown, but more yellow than the meat that I am used to eating at home. There are unsightly black patches in places where the meat appears to have been cooked too much. I am hesitant to take the first bite. It probably tastes even worse than it looks. I won't even dare wonder what the fibrous green mush next to it tastes like.

"Did you finish the part about magic safety yet?" Kenneth's words are slurred by the food in his mouth.

"I did."

"Fine, then. Recite the principles of safe beginner's spellcasting." Kenneth cuts another piece of meat onto his fork and lifts it to his mouth.

"Well, I remember one rule was to always get permission from an instructor before reciting a spell for the first time. And then there was -"

"Wrong." Kenneth cuts me off. "You must get permission every time you recite a spell. It doesn't matter if you have recited the spell before. It's still dangerous. Do you understand?"

"Yes." I nod.

"Just to be clear, who is the instructor whom you must ask permission from?"

"That instructor would be you," I reply.

"Good. What is the next rule?"

"The next rule is to never skip words when reciting spells," I recall aloud.

"That is correct," Kenneth replies as he chews. "If you do not recite the spell in its entirety, you will drain your mana but the spell will fail... if you're lucky. What is another rule?"

"The next rule was... hmm..." Before I can say it aloud, the rule barely escapes from my mind. I switch my focus to trying to remember the other rule. "I know one rule involved keeping track of... something to do with my energy."

Kenneth shakes his head. "No, Iris. Not just any energy: your mana pool. You are supposed to keep track of your mana pool. Early on, you will not be able to sense the mana itself, but you will be able to tell when your mana pool is completely drained. Do you remember how to tell?"

"I think the spell is supposed to pull on me somehow... painfully," I reply.

"That's right. When your mana pool is drained, any spell you cast will begin to draw from your own vital energy, and you will begin to feel pain. Now, suppose you're reciting a spell and you begin to feel pain. What do you do?"

"I stop the spell after I finish the sentence I am on," I reply.

"Right. You must finish the sentence to mitigate how much energy is drained, and then stop immediately. Never force a spell. If you feel pain, that's your body warning you that you are exerting yourself beyond your limits." Kenneth crosses his arms and leans back into his chair. "It doesn't matter where the pain is; the pain could start anywhere, even in the very tip of your pinky toe for all we know. It doesn't matter how small or seemingly insignificant the pain may be. By the time the pain starts to spread, it may already be too late. Have I made myself clear?"

"Yes, sir."

"Good. What is the last rule?"

"I can't remember..." I admit.

Kenneth's arms remain crossed. His brown eyes raise to meet my gaze.

"Unacceptable," He scorns. "You can't go on without knowing all of these safety rules by heart, and even then that wouldn't be enough. Every word in that book is worth its weight in gold. Unless you memorize that spellbook from cover to cover, you are going to be at a terrible disadvantage when we move on to the next spellbook. Do you understand this, Iris?"

I nod reluctantly. I am beginning to realize that Kenneth is a far stricter teacher than I had anticipated... and I am not sure I like that. Besides, it seems pointless to memorize an entire textbook just to learn the material. It reeks of the rote memorization exercises my schoolteacher Miss Fireheart used to give me.

"Keep in mind, you can't rush through the book just to memorize the words, either. You have to understand what you are reading, and not only that... you must read quickly."

Kenneth turns his head to the side. His brows clench slightly as if troubled by a distant thought, and then he forces his eyes shut. When he opens his eyes, his face is calm once more.

"Consider it a test," Kenneth continues. "You have three weeks to memorize every line, cast every spell, and prove that you understand all that you've learned. Succeed, and your training continues as normal. Fail, and your apprenticeship is over."

My jaw drops. Suddenly, the certain promise that I would become a powerful mage is replaced with just a possibility. What a nightmare it would be to learn the secrets of the energy of nature, to learn how to control it, to learn how to fulfill my dreams and become a beloved hero in the world... only to have it all taken away from me. A dream forever, relegated to story books! And to think Kenneth is the one pulling this ultimatum card on me? It is simply cruel!

"Why can't you just teach me like you said you would?" I protest. "Why must I pass some stupid rote memorization test?"

"If you think that my instruction is stupid, then I can bring you home tomorrow."

"No!" I plead.

"Then listen to me closely," Kenneth snaps. "In a little over a month, I will be attending my own graduation ceremony at the Bellsound School of Wind Magic. You will be coming with me. I have arranged a meeting after my graduation with my advisor, Grand-Mage Harris, to discuss the paperwork which would authorize me as an external instructor. In a nutshell, the paperwork would make our apprenticeship official. However, I first need to prove that the instruction I give you meets or exceeds the quality of instruction available at Bellsound. Otherwise, there's no way Grand-Mage Harris would authorize our apprenticeship, and I will have no choice but to bring you back home. This is the only chance you have to learn magic. Bellsound does not accept students as young as you, and even if they were to make an exception, they would still need permission from your parents, and your parents would never allow it."

I hang my head, feeling a little guilty. I should have known Kenneth was never like Miss Fireheart. He had good reasons behind his plans for my instruction, but I refused to have faith in him because I assumed he was just as dense as any other adult. But Kenneth is no ordinary man; he is a mage. I can only expect to achieve his abilities in magic if I listen to what he says.

"Now do you understand?" Kenneth asks.

I nod, this time in earnest.

"Aren't you going to eat your dinner? You aren't going to study well tomorrow if you sleep on an empty stomach."

"Oh, sorry," I apologize. Driven with new obedience, I pick up my fork and knife and cut into the meat.


	50. Chapter 49: The Helpful Stranger

Shapes. Colors. Sounds. Smells. What were once distant letters have merged inside of me to form words, phrases, tangible pieces of consciousness. It is as if Iris' memories are being reformed inside of me, as if I am experiencing them first-hand.

But now, at the very least, I can understand what is happening, why these sensations are appearing before me. I can finally distinguish Iris' memories from my own.

I strain my arm to reach for the last piece of paper stuck to my face. I feel my grip snag. A faint force tugs my cheeks. I pull hard and the mess of letters and sensations fade away, replaced with a burning pain across my face.

I open my eyes and see... nothing. Just darkness. I focus my ears and hear... nothing. Not even my own breath or heartbeat. Does that mean I'm dreaming?

"I'm afraid not..." I hear a familiar, deep voice reply softly in front of me.

A faint grey form appears in front of me, a light in this darkness as uncertain as a shadow in dim light. As I observe it, it becomes taller, more humanoid. I begin to notice slim, bony legs and long, slender fingers. Before my eyes rest directly upon the being's head, I compulsively turn away.

That hunched neck and slim, protruded jaw could only belong to an Enderman, but where its glowing eyes ought to be, there are only black, empty holes.

"There is no need to avert your gaze," the creature speaks in its slow, deep, metallic voice. "The fire in my eyes burnt out long ago."

I raise my gaze to the two black holes that ought to be eyes and, true to the creature's word, the creature remains still.

"If your eyes aren't glowing, then you must be dead. Does that mean I'm dead?" I ask.

"Not quite. Your body is elsewhere, but your mind is here, with me."

"How can I still be alive if I don't have my body anymore?"

"As someone who has been trapped here for millenia, I can assure you that this place is no afterlife. It is possible, although difficult, to interact with the outside world. I would myself... but I am so very tired..."

After letting out the last three words with an exasperated sigh, the grey form fades into the darkness.

"Please, come back!" I cry out. "If you know how to communicate with the outside world, then please, show me how!"

I pull at the pages clinging to my arms, binding my legs, glued against my back, until scraps of paper litter the black floor and my body throbs all over with fiery pain. Finally, I'm rid of those ticks!

I run forward into the darkness. If I'm not in my body anymore, then that means Iris took it from me. Iris could be attacking Jonas right now, and unless I find some way to interact with the outside world, there's nothing I can do about it!

Suddenly, I hear a click, as if I have suddenly awoken from a deep sleep. Dim light surrounds me, and I find myself standing in the aisle of a familiar library.

The bookshelves are as tall and impossibly long as I remember. I still remember the smell of old paper and wood shavings. However, now there are other smells: old wood, mold, and dry rot.

I sprint into the joining bookshelf aisle and glance left and right. To my right, I see the lightless Enderman walking slowly. I run up to it and grab its shoulder.

"Please, I beg of you!" I cry out. "Show me how to communicate with the outside world! My friend is in danger of being killed!"

"Son of Herobrine, have mercy..." the Enderman whispers. "After saving your life, my energy has been greatly drained. When I last checked, your body's hands were tied behind your back, your body unconscious from Ender fire and blood trauma. Please, I beg of you, let me rest and recover. There is still time to save your friend."

The creature sighs with the sound of an inflating balloon, except the rush of air is stuttered from the heaving of its trembling body. I lift my hand from its shoulder in sympathy.

"If you wish to make yourself useful," it whispers, "find one of the bookshelves that has collapsed, and repair the tattered and jumbled pages as you have done before. Perhaps it may help Iris see reason."

"I understand," I reply.

I turn around and run through the endless aisle, scanning the bookshelves for damage. After a minute of running, I see a mound of papers and crushed book bindings, partially buried in decaying wood. I walk closer, and notice the corners of some of the pages begin to lift up, as if gravitating towards me.

I clench my eyes shut and plant my legs firmly. I hear the sound of the first piece of paper flex as it tumbles through the air.

I don't know if I will ever get my body back, and after these pages consume me again, I don't even know if I will get my memories back. Perhaps it is futile to struggle against a being who can control minds, but I refuse to stand around idly. I owe it to Jonas... and to myself.


	51. Chapter 50: Ambitions

Today is a wonderful day indeed!

I breathe in the pristine mountain air until my lungs are bloated with it. I sink my arms elbow-deep into my dragon's down, its feathers each of every color of ten rainbows. Its wings bat with such finesse and such grace, that I feel as secure upon my dragon's back as if on solid ground, even as we climb ever higher into my butts.

Ever since I learned magic, everything has changed for the better. Just this morning, I spotted a prince and princess clinging for dear life from the balcony of a burning castle. Thankfully, I had mastered my storm spells just the week before, and so I judiciously called upon my rain spell to quench the castle of flames before any harm could be done, after which I sped down on the back of my dragon to ask the boy and girl if they were alright. The two lovers were so delighted by my heroic deed that they sped through the castle and brought to me a green velvet bag tied with gold tassel. As I soon learned after my departure, this was a magical bag, whose contents were constantly replenished with fresh muffins of every flavor imaginable. It was a thoughtful gift indeed, and just in time for breakfast!

I wipe the crisp muffin crumbs from the corner of my lips and lick the crumbs off my fingers. The roof of my mouth is still coated with the muffins' eggy and sugary dough. I lean back into my dragon's thick, plush down, my arms stretched wide upon the feathers, appreciating the fullness in my stomach.

...and what a delicious breakfast that was!

I roll over to the side of my dragon's back and look down. The lush green forest is so far beneath us now that it appears flat. My butts laying on the forest cling close to their shadows, making them appear like paper cutouts glued over a painting. All of it is muted by a thin white film of atmospheric fog, like a painting bleached by the sun.

I sit up and peek beyond my dragon's rainbow-colored mane. Far ahead of us are mountain peaks covered in snow and butts, a three-dimensional anomaly blocking the path to the horizon. Our destination is a castle somewhere beneath those butts, the Britwal School of Magical Arts, where I will meet with Kenneth for our daily magic training.

What spell will we be learning today? The tree-growing spell? The fire storm spell? The ultimate teleportation spell?

No, those spells sound too boring. I have an even better spell in mind: the Super-Incredibly-Undead-Annihilation Spell! What other legendary spell would be capable of vanquishing the army of undead approaching from the East tomorrow? Scratch that... the GIANT army of undead. And there will also be necromancers... and dire wolves... and evil fire wizards too... and they will all be riding dragons!

Now that I think about it, since most of those evil beings are not undead to begin with, I should also learn the Ultra-Incredibly-Evil-Magic Annihilation Spell as well. I already mastered the Super-Incredibly-Evil-Magic Annihilation Spell, but one can never be too careful when battling against Very-Incredibly-Evil-Magic. Training that spell to the next level is certain to secure my victory, even with all the Very-Incredibly-Evil Dragons on the opposing side.

I rub my hands together in excitement. There is going to be a lot of magical energy flying around in that mountain school today. I hope the custodians are ready because castle walls are definitely getting busted.

I hear a deep rumble beneath me as my dragon prepares to speak.

"Oh wise and mighty Iris," the dragon speaks in its deep, powerful voice, "Pardon me for questioning your wisdom, but could you perhaps be making too heavy use of common plot tropes? I am sensing that you have summoned yet another army of undead to challenge us from the east, and... please excuse me for saying this, as I love a good undead army battle as much as the next dragon... but I do hope you would consider adding some variety to the plot... perhaps by introducing a new, more formidable villain, or instead by padding the action with some filler to drain the emotional tension. Perhaps you could even make your main character face some relatable psychological weakness."

"Silence, dragon! I have no need for your brainless plot ideas!" I command. "I would destroy you this instant if I were not too lazy to come up with what the next dragon I summon would look like. Plus, your fur is really fluffy..."

I lean back into the down of the dragon and feel my body sink into it. I hope the flight to the mountain school lasts a few more hours so I can just lay here and appreciate how wonderful it is to rest in this perfect cushion.

I stretch my jaw open and yawn deeply. Before I can close my mouth again, I feel the urge to yawn once more. Even the fresh mountain air feels heavy and warm in my throat now.

"Why do I feel so tired all of a sudden?" I wonder aloud. I feel my eyelids close.

"Wake up, Iris!" I hear calling above me.

I yawn again. "What are you talking about? I haven't even fallen asleep yet!"

* * *

As I say those words, I feel myself mouthing them with my lips, and the exertion of my voice forces me awake. As the dim morning light brightens around me, I feel the lovely memories... of the view of the lush forest from the sky, of the dragon's uncountable rainbow feathers, of the taste of those perfectly sweet and eggy muffins... fade until they are nearly forgotten, no matter how hard I try to claw them back with the power of recollection.

My vision above me is blocked by the face of Kenneth leaning over me, his eyes devoid of sympathy for the damage he had caused by forcefully pulling me out of my dreams. How dare he make me forget the taste of those delicious muffins!

The image of Kenneth's smile registers in my sleepy mind, and I suddenly remember why I am here. Complaining about forgetting what dream-muffins taste like would not make a good first impression on Kenneth as my instructor.

"Glad to see you're awake. We're gonna be on a busy schedule, so you better get used to waking up early... haha!"

Kenneth emits his trademark awkward laugh again. I think it is starting to wear on me a little.

I stretch my arms from underneath the blankets and slide my legs out of bed. The floor under my feet is freezing cold. I lean forward, and feel cool air creep down my body as the blankets slide off of my arms.

I already miss being in my warm bed.

* * *

I sit down and drop the book onto the living room table. The thump of the impact makes me jump.

"Be careful with that book, Iris," Kenneth nags. "It's very difficult to replace."

"Okay. Sorry," I reply impatiently. I estimate the beginning of the first chapter and finger apart the pages of the textbook.

"Why are you giving me such a hard time?" Kenneth asks.

"I just want to get this over with," I insist frankly.

"There is no 'over with,' Iris. Every sentence in that book needs to be memorized and analyzed thoroughly, not glazed over like some leisurely shortcut through the woods! Did you find the first chapter yet?"

After flipping back a few pages, I spot the first chapter title in large, bold print. "Yes."

"Give me the book. I am going to show you how to do this properly."

I lift the open book over my head and feel the weight of the book lighten as Kenneth grabs it.

"Watch closely, now..."

I turn the weight of my body to the side and cling to the back of my chair.

Kenneth's eyes dart back and forth at the page beneath him. After a couple seconds, he closes the book and takes a breath to speak. He recites the sentences each in turn at a breakneck pace, all without any discernible pause to breathe. As far as I can tell from my memory of the text, Kenneth recites every word perfectly. Kenneth must have spent days just reciting that one passage over and over again... yet he recites the words so spontaneously and sincerely that I feel as if he is speaking directly to me, his voice ringing with the passion of a scholar as he lectures to me on the theories of magic, relishing in the subtle explanations.

Suddenly, Kenneth's voice cuts off mid-sentence, perhaps only a few paragraphs into the text, just as I begin to forget that the words he speaks came from the book in his hands.

Kenneth's lips twitch into a lopsided smirk. "That is how you properly spell-read:" he declares with pride, "You read so that it's all present in your mind at once, but without... how do I put this... thinking about what the words sound like."

"That... sounds complicated," I reply, at a loss for words.

Kenneth's face becomes stern. "It isn't complicated. It only sounds complicated because apparently you've never done it before, despite everything you're supposed to have learned in school. You just need to be in the right state of mind."

Just as my imagination began to soar with the mysterious nature of spellcasting magic, Kenneth pulls me back to the earth with morbid adult pragmatism. Could Kenneth at least attempt to make spell-reading sound as fun as it did earlier? Could he at least pretend it was complicated?

"What am I supposed to do, then?" I ask.

"You look at each word, and you understand what each word means. You visualize the meaning of each word in your head as you do so..." Kenneth touches his hand to his temple. "...without thinking about what the word sounds like, until you have a clear picture of the meaning in your mind. You must do that for every word in the sentence before you say the sentence aloud." He hands the book to me. "That should be a good place to start. Do that with each sentence until you've memorized the entire chapter."

I grab hold of the book once more, and feel the weight of the spellbook return to my arms as Kenneth walks away.

* * *

I have a terrible headache.

I rest my chin upon a page of the spellbook. My pupils scan carefully upon the letters on the page, yet the words no longer have any meaning.

A day and a half has already passed and I am still trapped on the first chapter, even though I can already recite every detail. I remember all the compound elements and the unclassified element Aether. I remember how all people, animals, and monsters innately spawn with a mana pool of a certain element, and that a human's dominant element is Earth at spawn. I remember how a sufficiently weak spell can be cast using any form of magic. I remember why a sentient being is vastly more difficult to levitate than an inanimate object of the same weight...

And I could keep going on and on! Yet, in spite of my perfect knowledge of chapter, Kenneth insists that it is not enough. Four times I have tried to show Kenneth that I am ready to move on to the next chapter, yet every time he refuses with the same bland, uninterested disappointment.

The first time I recited the chapter, Kenneth complained that my prose was flat. The second time, he complained that I was being too dramatic. The third time, he complained that my prose was flat again. And the fourth time, he complained that I was speaking "out of character." What is Kenneth supposed to be teaching me, acting lessons?

Kenneth said spell-reading was not supposed to be complicated, so why do I not already understand it? Surely a girl with my level of intelligence should be able to comprehend the chapter of any adult book within a day. The only possible explanation is that Kenneth is holding me back on purpose. These acting lessons are just the first of Kenneth's many convoluted instructional milestones, designed to slow me down, to prevent me from learning real magic...

...yet surely that cannot be the case! Kenneth would not have accepted me as his apprentice only to waste time teaching me useless information.

...unless it just seems like useless information because I do not understand it. Did Kenneth make a mistake in choosing me as his apprentice? Am I simply incapable of comprehending magic entirely? Is the great magician I imagined myself as in my dream... never going to be more than just a dream? No dragons, no heroic deeds, no earth-shaking spells?

How would I be able to tell?


	52. Chapter 51: Not Out of the Woods

I wake up. I had a weird dream. And now my headache is gone.

My headache had gotten so bad that I had it even in my dream. It was a strange dream. I was playing a board game composed of a meter-wide block of wood which was riddled with holes. Some of the holes had pegs inserted inside of them. My task as the player was to pull out a peg from one of the holes and insert it into another. But whenever I tried to bring the peg near another hole, my hand would be pushed away, as if by some invisible force. And every time that happened, my headache would become intensely painful, as if I was struggling to grasp some idea distant from my mind.

I glance at the sandstone rock sitting on the nightstand next to my bed. I recited my very first spell on that rock for a few hours yesterday. The spell was much shorter than the chapters I had recited previously, perhaps twenty pages long, and thus reading those few pages over and over made me feel like I was slowly dying inside. Every time I would finish the spell, I would quickly lay my hand upon the rock, to see if the temperature of the rock changed.

After a few hours of drudgery and concentration-induced headaches, I felt a small cramp in my left calf. I then stopped reading the spell the moment I finished my sentence. I am not certain whether that cramp in my calf was really caused by the spell. Maybe the pain was just a figment of my imagination. Maybe I let all that fear-mongering in the safety portion of the textbook get to my head. Maybe I could have recited the spell for just a few more hours.

I could never tell for certain if the rock felt any warmer. I want so badly to believe that it did.

* * *

After breakfast, Kenneth leaves me alone again, and I resume reciting the spell. The headache I get is less painful than it was yesterday; maybe I am starting to get used to this intense level of concentration.

But then, after only an hour of recital, I feel the same small cramp in my left calf.

Maybe I am not sitting in this chair correctly. I straighten my legs and continue reciting the spell. A few minutes pass, and the pain in my calf grows stronger.

Maybe I should stop.

I finish my sentence and pull my eyes away from the page.

Even so, I find it suspicious that I feel the pain in the same place that I did yesterday. Maybe I slept in a funny position these past few nights. Maybe if I ask Kenneth about it, he will reassure me that there is nothing to worry about, and I can continue reciting the spell as before.

I slide out of my chair and land my feet on the ground. I should ask him, just to be safe.

I walk up to the door to Kenneth's study and knock.

"Just a few minutes," calls Kenneth's muffled voice from the other side of the door.

"Every time you say that, you take way too long," I insist. "Can you please answer my question? It is really important, and I promise it will only take a moment."

"No. It can wait."

I sigh deeply.

"Also, can you please not pick your skin while you're waiting? It's really gross."

"I do not pick my skin!" I insist.

* * *

Kenneth finally steps out of the door, holding a stack of books in his arms. "So? What was your question?"

"I am trying to figure out why my leg was hurting while I was reciting the spell, even though I had only been reciting the spell for an hour," I explain.

"Of course it did," Kenneth responds objectively. "Your mana pool drained quite a while ago. It wasn't finished regenerating from yesterday."

"Is there any way you could fix it?" I ask. "Maybe you could cast a spell on me? Or give me a potion?"

Kenneth smiles and rolls his eyes. "Oh Iris, it really does not work that way!"

Kenneth's unnatural smile irks me. "Why are you smiling at me like that all of a sudden? What is so funny?"

"Oh nothing, really." Kenneth's smile grows wider. "You just have a lot to learn. Go play outside or something. You need a break."

"But I just started an hour ago!" I argue.

"Go play outside, Iris. That's an order." Kenneth is still smiling at me. He is mocking me, isn't he?

I drag my feet to the front door and slowly open it. As I walk through the door and into the open air, I grip the doorknob tightly, only letting go of it long after the door has closed.

Kenneth reminded me of my parents. He made me feel like a child. I hate him for that.

...but I also miss my parents.

I look up at the low-floating sun glowing just above the trees. It is still morning.

I turn my head right, looking at the faint path snaking southward between the trees.

I could run away. I could go home. I could see my parents again. I could see my friends. It would only take a day's journey if I start now. I would just have to follow the trail to Britwal City, and from there it's only a few hour's walk to my home town of Maplefall.

I may never be able to learn magic again if I leave... but I also have to punish Kenneth for treating me so dismissively.

I was already at my wit's end. All those days I spent studying intensely from the textbook, and where was Kenneth all that time, except in his study? Why didn't he teach me anything? Why did he put so many barriers in my way, giving me only a month to finish the textbook, forcing me to continue re-reading chapters well after I had memorized them? The reason is because I am not really Kenneth's apprentice. Kenneth brought me here solely to mock me. I lose nothing if I run away now.

I turn toward the house again and open the front door slowly, peeking in to make sure that Kenneth is not watching. Then I enter the foyer, close the door behind me, and walk into the kitchen, where I make plans for my departure.

* * *

Maybe I took a wrong turn.

I turn back upon the forest path yet again, searching left and right. My legs are sore and burning.

Hanging against my hip is a makeshift bag I created by tying a blanket in a knot. With every other step, the weight of the bottled water inside of the bag bobs against my side.

When the sun is well overhead, I pause to sit and eat the lunch of melon and bread in my bag. Then I stand up, brush the dry autumn leaves off of my legs, and begin walking again.

I could have sworn that Britwal City was to the south, but perhaps I was mistaken. I have no choice but to return to Kenneth's house to avoid getting stranded in the dark.

I turn back once again and continue walking.

Surely Kenneth's house must be just around the next bend in the forest. Why does it feel like I have been walking for too long? Did I miss some other intersecting trail?

Pine trees become replaced with unfamiliar birch. The sky dims. I can no longer see the forest path.

I hear cracking joints and smacking lips.

The undead are beginning to spawn.

I hear rapid footsteps and sliding pebbles behind me. My heart begins to knock hard against my chest. I sprint into the slope of a hill and climb through the brush, looking for some place to hide... a cave, an indentation in a tree, a burrow... anything!

A weight slams into my back and pins me down into the ground. A twig scratches against my cheek. I hear heavy, distorted breathing. A rancid flesh smell makes me want to gag, but I cannot, as my lungs are compressed too much to breathe deeply.

Something cold grabs my arm. I feel myself dragged against the dirt. The weight of the zombie falls off of me. I feel myself being lifted. I look up toward my new captor and see a skeleton wearing leather armor. I kick the skeleton as hard as I can, but I feel as if I am attempting to kick against a solid wall. The skeleton pulls me firmly against its side.

"Let me go! Help me! Someone help me!" I yell hopelessly into the forest.

Then I scream.

"I am not here to kill you," the skeleton says calmly. "I am here to help you. Just close your eyes. Everything is going to be alright."

I close my eyes. But then I scream again.

The skeleton begins to run. I wonder whether or not I am going to die.

* * *

I see a light. A door opens. I hear boot footsteps as I stare at a wood ceiling. I fall onto a sofa.

The face of a woman wearing a leather chestplate leans over me. Her hair is caramel brown.

It is as if there was a discontinuity of reality. What was the skeleton I saw earlier? Was this woman the skeleton?

She smiles. "Are you alright, kiddo?"

"Where are we?" I ask.

"This is my house," she answers.

"Yes, but WHERE are we? Are we near Britwal?" I ask. "And what happened to the skeleton?"

"Britwal is eight hours from here, but now is really not a good time to be outside. Please calm down." There is a worried look in the woman's face. "What's your name?"

"Iris." I answer.

"Are you hurt, Iris?" the woman asks.

I survey my body. With the exception of a scratch on my cheek from when the zombie knocked me to the ground, I feel no pain.

"No, I am fine," I answer.

"Where are your parents?" she continues. "Are they down in Britwal?"

"No, they live in Maplefall," I correct her.

"Oh, Notch! All the way in Maplefall? How in the world did you get here?"

Suddenly a gleam of curiosity shines in her eyes. She looks at me funny. Then her brows rise in surprise.

"Don't tell me you're Forthright's new apprentice!" She blurts out.

"You mean Kenneth Forthright?" I ask. How did she guess I was Kenneth's apprentice?

"Yes, Kenneth Forthright!" The woman's eyes grow wide. "What the heck is he doing with a young kid like you? And what were you doing out here so late?"

"I was trying to walk home to my parents, but I took a wrong turn," I admit frankly. "How did you know I was Kenneth's apprentice? Did you turn into a skeleton?"

The woman smiles and sits down on the couch near my feet. "It's not every day I see a little kid running around with their mana pool completely drained. And yes, I can turn into a skeleton. Pretty neat, huh? I'm sorry if I scared you."

"It is alright. I have a thick skin," I reply.

The woman chuckles. "I am pretty sure that's not what 'thick skin' means, but close enough."

"How do you know Kenneth?" I ask.

"Kenneth and I are colleagues," she replies. "We study alternate dimensions together. Pretty cool stuff. I'd love to talk about it, but it's getting pretty late, and a girl like you really ought to be getting some shut-eye by now. Have you had dinner yet?"

"No," I answer. Suddenly I become conscious of a gnawing emptiness in my stomach. I have not eaten since early in the afternoon.

* * *

It is morning again. I stand in front of the door to Kenneth's house. The woman who transformed into a skeleton last night, Sarah, is standing behind me.

I knock on the door. A few moments pass in silence. I knock on the door again, and wait.

The door opens inward. Kenneth's face pokes out. His eyes widen in surprise.

"Gods..." Kenneth speaks with a sigh. "You're alive."

Kenneth opens the door all the way. As I step into the foyer, I feel the warm indoor air surround me again. I take off my shoes.

"So you DO know her!" Sarah remarks.

"Sarah, where did you find her?" Kenneth asks, his voice serious, almost accusatory.

"I ran into her last night when a zombie was just about to eat her brains. She was about thirty minutes south from my house. You should be grateful I was there to save her. What were you even thinking? You can't just let a little girl walk back to her parent's house all by herself!"

"Please stop calling me a little girl," I insist.

"I don't remember authorizing her to go back to her parents," Kenneth counters. He turns to face me. "Iris, you've made a promise that you cannot break. You're my apprentice now. You can't just visit your parents whenever you want. You need to stay here and study."

"I do not have to be your apprentice any more if I do not want to!" I fight back. "Especially if my master refuses to teach me!"

Something grotesque happens to Kenneth's face. It is an emotion that I have never seen before.

"Kenneth, don't do it," Sarah orders.

The grotesque look in Kenneth's face vanishes.

"I'm sorry," Kenneth says. His pupils sink down in shame. "I got carried away."


	53. Chapter 52: Philosophy

It is roughly noon. Kenneth and I are walking along a forest trail which wraps along a steep hill. Below us is a fern-covered creek.

In Kenneth's hand is a long, black staff. Both ends are tipped with sharpened iron tongs, bent inward like half-opened claws. Kenneth said it was for hunting.

Back in Maplefall, Kenneth and I used to go on many walks like this. Sometimes he would ask me simple things, like how school was going, or what I thought of the weather. Other times he would show me simple magic tricks, like card tricks or optical illusions. I did not think much of it at first; I though he was just one of my neighbors. Later on, Kenneth started to ask me deeper, philosophical questions. His questions began to challenge the rules of my parents and my school that I once complacently followed. I began to wonder if Kenneth's magic tricks were more than just sleights of hand. The more I spoke with him, the larger his world seemed compared to my own...

...but I had fooled myself into believing I would join that world.

"Iris..." Kenneth begins hesitantly, "I know you're thinking about running away again."

I say nothing, preferring not to affirm the obvious. I would have run away sooner, if I was not dependent on Kenneth for food.

"I really hope you reconsider," Kenneth continues. "You have so much potential. And I'd hate to see it all go to waste."

"I am not reconsidering," I state. "All this time, you have taught me nothing. You leave me with a spellbook that I do not know how to use, and then you shut yourself off in your study for the rest of the day."

Kenneth stops walking suddenly. He turns around to face me, anger locked in his brow.

"You know NOTHING," Kenneth seethes. "I cannot even begin to describe how wrong you are. All this time, I have been slaving over academic work. You have no business knowing it because it is simply beyond your comprehension at this point. But it is very important, I assure you. It is certainly more important than babying you over some introductory spellcasting techniques that you should be intelligent enough to teach yourself!"

I am speechless. Kenneth completely dismissed my criticism. Was I wrong to want help?

"Maybe this was not meant to be," I finally admit.

"Why do you say that? Because you think you aren't good enough?"

"No. There is just not enough time," I say.

"How would you know that? It's hardly been a week," Kenneth insists.

"It is just that..."

"Just listen to yourself," Kenneth says, his tone becoming softer, more patronizing. "You are making excuses. Where is your confidence? Where is your pride?" He puts his hand on my shoulder. "Don't let your doubts consume you. Just give it your all. A lot can happen in a few weeks."

I shrug Kenneth's hand off of my shoulder. "No. You are wrong."

"But you are intelligent, aren't you?"

"That is not what I meant!" I yell, hands clenching into fists. "I am not scared and I am not stupid! I never said I was! I simply refuse to be your apprentice any longer!"

"Oh..." Kenneth's brows heighten in emphatic sadness. "I see what the problem is. You've just lost your motivation." He smiles. "I think I can fix that."

Kenneth bends down, lays down his staff, sits on the dusty trail, and beckons for me to sit.

I sit down with resistance. I will not let myself react to Kenneth's sudden friendly shift of tone.

Kenneth's gaze turns toward the creek below. I follow his gaze and spot multiple animals walking along its bank: a flock of large birds and a feral cow.

"Some people claim," says Kenneth, "that they can see an animal's soul when they look into their eyes. Have you ever looked into an animal's eyes, Iris?"

I nod.

"What did you see?" he asks. "Do you think you could see their soul?"

"I do not know," I reply. "Sometimes light shines in their eyes, but I am not sure if this is just because light is reflecting off of them. But I am certain that animals have souls. They are living creatures, after all. Just like us."

"You would be correct," says Kenneth, "although the light in their eyes really is just a reflection. Most people who claim to have seen an animal's soul are really lying to themselves. I am one of the few people who actually has seen their souls."

"How could you see their souls?" I ask, rather skeptical of his claim.

"With void magic, of course."

"Oh..." I reply, not very satisfied with the answer. "But what I really mean to ask is... how did you use void magic to see their souls?"

"I don't know, to be honest." Kenneth smiles sadly. "It's one of those things that just came naturally to me, once I was able to control the void. I believe the void-fire allows me to penetrate some sort of psychic barrier. It's quite fascinating. I can predict exactly what the animal is about to do next. I can tell when the animal is hungry... or sad... or afraid. But it isn't necessarily what an animal thinks that is surprising, it's what an animal doesn't think."

"What do you mean?" I ask.

"Well, most of the time, an animal isn't thinking anything at all. Their mind is completely blank. They are exactly as dumb as you would imagine them to be."

"That does not sound right," I reply.

"But it's true!" Kenneth insists. "Animals have inferior minds. They cannot plan, or reason, or even appreciate their own existence. But that is not even the most surprising thing I've learned. The most surprising thing comes from the minds of humans themselves. Care to take a guess at what that might be?"

"What? That humans are stupid too?" I joke sarcastically.

"Of course not. Humans are quite intelligent. That's not the point. It makes no difference that humans are more intelligent than animals. The truth is that there is one thing that humans and animals have in common: both are incapable of free will. Human existence is just as meaningless and devoid of choice as that of animals."

"That is wrong," I insist. "I know I have free will. The actions and choices I make are my own."

"I never said there weren't exceptions," says Kenneth. "You are one of the few people who truly can think for themselves. That is why you have to stay here. Magic can unlock your potential in ways that ordinary humans couldn't even comprehend!"

I cannot help but notice the excitement within Kenneth's wide eyes. They are frightening, but they also hint at some tantalizing truth. What is it? What is it like to feel what Kenneth feels?

I snap myself out of it. This is no time to give in to hollow dreams.

"Do you remember the dragon from your dream?" asks Kenneth, "the dragon with rainbow feathers, that could fly higher than the clouds? The dragon you said you could ride whenever you wanted to?"

I nod. I do not remember telling Kenneth about that dream, but I still remember the dream. It was one of my favorite dreams. I wish I could return to it again.

"Are dragons real?" I ask.

"Well, we're not sure, actually. We've never actually seen one. We have reason to believe that they do exist, though."

"Really?" I cry with glee. Then I return to reason, remembering that I am supposed to be angry at Kenneth right now. "I do not believe you."

"Well, perhaps if you study hard, you may be able to find out someday." Kenneth smiles whimsically.

I ponder Kenneth's words. "I do not want to study about dragons unless I can tame them."

"Well, nobody knows yet if dragons can be tamed yet. You would have to study first to find out. That's how magic works, too. You don't get to know about it unless you work really hard first. That is why you have to learn the introductory spells on your own."

Kenneth drags the side of his hand against the ground and gathers the soil into his palms. He lifts his enclosed palms up to his face, blows briefly, and lets the dirt fall. A tiny yellow spark leaps from plume to plume, causing the flowing wisps to coalesce into a four-legged creature. As the creature's feet land upon the ground, its form becomes clear: it is a miniature dragon, with graceful feathered wings whose transient dirt tendrils flicker like tongues of flame, and a long tail which swishes slowly back and forth. Even though it is only an illusion, it is very beautiful.

Maybe I should stay a little longer, just so I can learn the spell that Kenneth just used.

Just as I begin to consider reaching my hand out towards the illusionary dragon, Kenneth blows briefly, and the swirling form of dirt collapses lifelessly onto the ground.


	54. Chapter 53: Power

It is halfway through the third week, and I am still only on the second spell. To this day, I do not know if I ever cast the first spell properly, because the temperature of the rock never seemed to change. Perhaps Kenneth only let me move on out of empathy. I doubt he will continue to be so forgiving.

It is all the fault of my feeble, unreliable mana pool. I can only spend four hours reciting spells before the pain in my left calf forces me to abandon the spellbook for the rest of the day. There are still fifteen spells left, and only the lesser half of the month remains. I feel my chances of finishing the book and becoming Kenneth's true apprentice slipping away.

Sometimes, when I can no longer recite the spell, I sort Kenneth's papers or read fiction books. The rest of the time, I wander outside.

There was some good that came out of it. I found a giant spider which enjoys basking in a nearby forest clearing in the early afternoon. I am trying to befriend it. So far, I have tried giving it morsels of food left over from dinner, but it does not seem to respond. It does not mind when I pet it, though. Its prickly abdomen hairs always leave a strange, tingly feeling on my fingers. It is such a peaceful creature. It makes me wonder why humans and monsters cannot just live together peacefully.

I shake my head, forcing myself to return my concentration to the words in the spell. My eyes lock back at the letter I left off, and I begin parsing the words again. I come to the critical note in the spell:

"[After reading the following paragraph, focus your attention immediately upon the object you wish to levitate.]"

I read the final paragraph of the spell, and lock my eyes upon the sandstone rock at the center of the table. Something feels different this time. My will and desire feel heightened. A hole is forming within my mind, like an empty clay mold, into which a newfound power is pouring... forming... awakening. I feel a stream of consonants roll down my tongue and onto my lips:

Lift.

The sandstone rock obeys my command, elevating itself just centimeters above the table.

I cannot believe my own eyes. The rock is floating, after all those hours I spent reciting these spells in futility!

I can almost imagine the weight of the rock in my mind, as if I am holding the rock with a fifth limb. Can I lift it higher, I wonder?

The rock rises a tenth of a meter above the table. I cannot help but smile.

Can I spin it, too?

The rock begins to spin rapidly. Its motions are a blur. I fear that at the speed that the rock spins, either the rock will tear itself apart, or my mana pool will be completely drained.

Slow down, please!

The rock spins more slowly. I no longer feel the rock as simply a weight on an invisible limb. There is a leftness and a rightness to the rock, a back and front, a top and bottom. I can stop the rock in place and rotate it whichever way I please. I giggle with glee!

I hold out the palm of my hand. The rock drifts toward me and lays itself gently into it. I grasp the rock with my fingers.

This is just like the coin trick Kenneth showed me.

I set the rock down and look inquisitively at the spellbook laid open on the table. Could I lift it too?

The memory of levitating the rock remains strong. I doubt I even have to recite the spell again.

I focus my vision upon the binding of the spellbook.

Lift.

The spellbook rises a few centimeters.

Higher, I say!

The spellbook rises and tilts forward so I can see its pages. It feels heavier than the rock. Its weight is almost tangible.

I wonder if I can levitate the spellbook while reciting spells at the same time...

At my command, the pages flip back of their own accord as I scan for the start of the second spell. For the first time in several days, I feel a headache again. That must mean my magic is growing stronger again. I am unlocking my true potential!

After a brief lapse in concentration, I notice that the pages of the book are flipping in the wrong direction. The disorder irks me. I stop the motion of the pages and make them move the other way again. The height of the book begins to falter. It is as if the book is rebelling against me!

Suddenly I feel a pain in my left calf. The pain shoots upward and begins to squeeze my chest. My neck goes limp. I watch the book bounce off the table. I fall out of my chair, and my side slams against the hardwood floor.

* * *

I am floating in a sea of grey. Without any cause, I feel an incredible, overwhelming guilt.

Is this my day of judgment?

Yet other emotions surface in this sea: anger and worry... perhaps even a hint of amusement. Perhaps they belong to the god who is about to judge me. Perhaps at this very moment, that god is sifting through my mortal past; observing, with cynicism, the manifestations of my mortal flaws.

I feel a faint pressure on my eyelids. Gravity returns, and a chair solidifies beneath me. The sea of grey begins to coalesce into a pair of silver, glowing irises. My entire body feels sore.

I feel a cool piece of glass push against my lips. Two fingers pinch my nose shut.

"Drink this," a voice commands.

The glass tilts against my lips. A liquid pours into my mouth, and I swallow it.

I gasp. The air is the purest I have ever breathed. The pain vanishes.

The formless fog around the glowing irises coalesces into the face of a middle-aged man. His nose and cheeks are bony. His dark, oily grey hair is pulled back tightly, revealing a receding hairline. Surrounding his face is the hood of a red robe with gold trim. His red robe is fastened across his shoulders with a light-grey cloth.

The man's fingers lift from my eyelids. The silver light in his irises fade, and I feel guilty no more.

Kenneth is leaning over him, a glass bottle filled with red liquid in his hand. There is a tired, angry look in Kenneth's eyes.

"How long have I been unconscious?" I ask Kenneth.

"A day," he responds.

My memories leading up to my unconsciousness are few. All I can remember is struggling to recite a boring spell.

Then a revelation springs to mind. I remember a single, tantalizing word:

Lift.

The bottle flies out of Kenneth's hand. Shattered glass echoes.

"Notch smite it, Iris!" Kenneth snaps. "Are you trying to get yourself killed?"

The meanings of his words twist in my mind, contradicting each other, stuffing my mind until they push painfully against the walls of my head... against the spine of my back... my arms... my legs... everywhere. I am completely and utterly paralyzed by the pain.

I feel fingers grasp onto my arms as the world starts to tilt.

"Bring me the spellbook and a mana potion," the red-hooded man commands, "and another healing potion, for Notch's sake."

"Yes, master," says Kenneth. He walks away.

The hooded man pats my cheek and holds my head upright. "Iris, I need you to stay awake." There is a reassuring calmness in his voice. "Do you understand what I am telling you? Nod if you understand."

I nod.

"Good. Now, listen to me carefully: Kenneth is going to bring you the spellbook that you just used to recite the levitation spell. You are to recite the spell, directly from the textbook, from the exact word that I specify, up until the end. Failure to do so properly could lead to your death."

"What did I do wrong?" I ask weakly. The pain is beginning to make me feel nauseous.

"You did not recite the spell directly from the spellbook like you were supposed to, which bypassed the limit on the amount of mana that could be drawn from the spell. Because you do not have sufficient control of your own mana pool, you cannot stop the spell on your own," he explains.

"Iris forgot the third rule? Again? You have got to be kidding me," says Kenneth.

"Enough peanut talk. Hand me the healing potion, quickly!" orders the hooded man.

The world is dark again. I feel a glass surface push against my lips again, and bitter liquid fills my mouth. I force my tongue against the back of my throat... and swallow.

The pain and nausea leave my body. They are replaced by a growing desire in my mind to recite that one, powerful word again; the one word that binds me to the world of magic, but I know will drive me unconscious again if I use it.

"Before you recite the spell," says the hooded man, "I need you to drink just one sip from this potion." He uncorks a bottle filled with purple liquid and hands it to me. "It should give you enough mana to recite the spell, but do not dilly-dally or all the energy will be wasted on your failed spell."

I nod in understanding and take a sip. My nose crinkles compulsively at the potion's terribly bitter and sour taste. I set the bottle down on the floor.

"Start here," the hooded man orders. He sets the book open upon my lap facing me, and rests his bony finger just above the start of a paragraph, "this paragraph after the sentence that ends with 'growth.' Do not recite the word 'growth,'" he insists.

I quickly lock my eyes upon the start of the paragraph and recite it as fast as my mind will let me. In the corner of my vision, I can see Kenneth and the red-hooded man staring intently at me.

Grueling minutes pass. I finally come to the critical note just before the end of the spell:

"[After reading the following paragraph, focus your attention immediately upon the object you wish to levitate.]"

I read the final paragraph. With no designated object to levitate, I focus on the spellbook itself.

Lift.

The book rises out of my hands. I do not want to expend all my energy again, so I let the book float gently back down.

The temptation to recite that powerful word fades from my mind.

I hear the two men sigh in relief.

"Notch..." Kenneth mutters.

"Do you feel anything, Iris?" asks the hooded man.

"Not any more," I say. "I felt a need to levitate things just a moment ago, but after I recited this spell, that feeling went away."

"I figured such," says the hooded man, "but are you sure you don't feel anything else? Something even the slightest unsettling or uncomfortable?"

"I do not think so," I say.

"Good," says the hooded man. "I supposed I'm obliged to introduce myself, then."

The man reaches for my hand and shakes it.

"I am Jacob Miner, an Arch-Mage of void magic and Forthright's master. Should you have any questions regarding magic or your apprenticeship, I am just as available to you as Forthright is."

This, of course, is not saying much, since Kenneth has made a habit of avoiding me whenever possible. Perhaps that is just how apprenticeships work around here.

Jacob Miner's eyes glare knowingly at Kenneth. "And I certainly hope that you bring this girl here on a regular basis from now on, so we can avoid any more... 'surprises.'"

"Master, I assure you, this was just an isolated event!" Kenneth pleads. "But I will do as you say, of course."

"Two times where an apprentice nearly dies in the same month can hardly be considered isolated events. We need to talk about this," says Miner. "Wait here, Iris."

The two magi disappear into a hallway trimmed with molding and filled with picture frames.


	55. Chapter 54: A Mind for a Mind

I start to notice a tingling sensation on my neck, and wonder whether I should have mentioned this to Miner when he asked me how I was feeling.

The tingling is replaced with a growing pressure around my neck, and before I have the sense to react, I am pinned against my seat, and my throat is sealed shut with the force of a squeezing hand.

An amorphous humanoid figure appears in front of me, holding my throat. Pages of text cling to it and fly around it violently, taking off and landing from the surface of the figure like a swarm of enraged flies.

"WHAT ARE YOU DOING?" bellows the figure.

"Who are you?" I struggle to mouth with my lips. I feel my pulse beating painfully against the walls of my neck.

"I am nobody," the figure proclaims. "You, on the other hand, should be dead. Every facet of your personality should have disintegrated in the void thousands of years ago. Why are you still here? Why do you persist in reliving your broken, useless memories? Why won't you DIE?!" the figure screams.

A smile creeps up my face as I realize I know something the figure does not. I am not the girl I thought myself to be. I am Fristad, reliving this girl's memories. The voice of this figure is in fact the voice of the Book.

"So, I finally found your weakness, didn't I?" I say. "I'm guessing reliving your past self's memories really got under your skin?"

"I had nothing to do with the production of your infantile human memories! You are but a ghost to me."

"Are you so sure about that, Iris?"

"That is not my name!"

The room trembles with the strength of an earthquake. The illusion shatters and is replaced by a horizon of darkness.

A sudden calmness comes over the demeanor of the paper-covered figure. The rumbling quake slows and stops, and the swarming pages settle upon the surface of the figure.

"So, Fristad, you were responsible for reawakening the girls memories..." A deliberate, measured composure has returned to the Book's voice. It is a voice more fearfully familiar, a voice with the intent to control me.

I won't let it.

"Your boldness is not a virtue, Fristad. You have interfered in matters beyond your authority. It sickens me enough that I may have to rid myself of your existence."

"Is returning me to my body a viable option?" I suggest.

"No. I will kill you right here. It will be a slow, torturous process. I will turn the girl's broken memories into a slow-acting poison. For every memory you try to piece together, one of your own memories will be erased, until you finally cease to exist."

"If me repairing the memories is such a problem for you, then why haven't you killed me already?" I question. "Why does my death have to be so slow and elaborate?"

The illusion of the living room snaps back into place. The hand tightens even more painfully around my neck. I can hear myself gurgle as the air is squeezed out.

"Are you sure you want to die NOW, Fristad?" the Book sneers.

My lungs feel shriveled. The pain consumes my mind. My illusionary body begs for me to give in to the Book, to take back my challenge against it, to make this pain stop.

"Of course I don't want to die! I didn't mean it that way!"

I feel the pain lift from my neck. The living room fades to darkness. The remaining sensation of nothingness is a pleasant relief.

"Then you will do as I say and leave the memories of the dead girl alone."

With those words, the figure covered in pages vanishes into the blackness.

* * *

The enderman sits at a library table, its long torso laid flat over much of the table's width. Its head is laid sideways such that its blackened eye-holes face me. I am uncertain if the creature's eyes are open, but I am almost certain that it is asleep.

I walk up to the sleeping enderman and push against its shoulder.

"Please wake up," I plead.

The enderman lifts its head sluggishly. "I have hardly slept. Must you wake me?"

"The Book gave an ultimatum," I say. "Either I stop repairing Iris' memories, or it would slowly destroy my own memories."

"She's bluffing," says the enderman. "Keep repairing the memories. If you repeat your previous effort ten thousand-fold, I should be well rested enough to assist you."

"The Book is powerful enough to control me, and she's only getting stronger," I state, growing increasingly annoyed. "I've already been at this for an hour, at least. I am not exactly interested in waiting ten thousand hours for your help. Do you have any idea how long ten thousand hours is?"

"I am well aware and, frankly, I don't care. Sentient beings are all the same: selfish, manipulative parasites. I tolerate you because your cause is just, but nothing I do to help you will benefit me. I've been controlled by others for too long to trust anyone with my sacrifices."

"What do you mean?" I ask.

The enderman sits up. I feel a spark of hope; perhaps he will stay awake.

"Iris was the last person I trusted with my sacrifices," says the enderman. "She was a special case. I thought she would be different because she wasn't a member of my own kind. I was wrong, of course."

"How were you treated by your own kind?" I ask.

"My own kind trapped me in this place so they could exploit me for my knowledge. I wouldn't say I was entirely blameless. My imprisonment was a punishment for a crime I committed long ago. I can't quite remember what it was."

"So they trapped you here forever?"

"That was the intention, yes."

"Sounds rather draconian," I say.

"Depends on the crime," says the enderman. "It's not like it matters. I really should go back to sleep."

The enderman begins to lay down.

"Tell me more," I insist. "I want to help you. We can find a way to both escape."

There is also so much more I want to know about this enderman. What was his world like? What knowledge could be so important that his captors kept him alive? How else did he become so cynical and helpless? And what happened to Iris?

"You couldn't help me even if you tried," the enderman mumbles lazily. "I am imprisoned here forever. You can save yourself, but only if you consult more of Iris' memories."

"I'm not touching those things," I say. "I heard what the Book said."

"Your loss."

"I'm going to find another way," I insist, "and if I don't, I'm going to wake you up again."

"I will be as mute as death," says the enderman.

I breathe an annoyed sigh and run into the adjacent library hall, wondering how I would be able to communicate with the outside world.

How was the Book able to communicate telepathically into my mind? I honestly have no idea, but there is another way. Earlier on, the Book communicated with me by writing words between its pages. Perhaps if I write something inside one of the library books, it will appear in the pages of the Book in the outside world.

I scour the hallways for several minutes before finding a lone flint pen upon a table, and grab a book in the best condition I can find.

I sit down at the table, open the book to the buffer page, and bring the flint to the paper:

* * *

If you are reading this, please help me. My name is Fristad Heltz and I have been trapped inside of this Book. Please let me know what is going on out there. If you know what happened to Jonas, tell me if he is alright. You may be able to reach me by writing on the pages of this Book.

* * *

As I finish writing the message, I notice that the first words I wrote are gradually fading away. The flint pen in my hand is likewise disappearing from the upper end down. Eventually the words on the page fade away, and the pen in my hand turns to air.

At least it did something. I just hope that the message reaches the outside world.

I stare at the blank page of the book with uncertain hope.


	56. Chapter 55: Magic Missile

I absentmindedly reach my fingers to my cheek to scratch it, only to again be made aware of the goggles I am now wearing. It is yet another symptom of my monstrous instincts getting the best of me.

We approach a three-story cobblestone house whose bottom story is a pub. It's just a few hundred meters from Bluesteel's gigantic spike-tipped walls. One of Bluesteel's military tunnels runs directly underneath the pub. During peacetime, the tunnel has become rather neglected by city officials. This makes it possible to enter the city out of sight of city guards, hence the name 'side entrance.'

Dan's not worried, but he should be. We are going to need all the help we can get to pass through the 'side entrance' without any trouble. Several gangs monitor the tunnel. Some are out for blood. Even if Dan gets through the tunnel peacefully, chances are there are a few folks in the pub who are sober enough to remember us passing through. Most are just as shady as Dan and most wouldn't bat an eye, but there are always exceptions. A half-blood and a limp body are two things rather hard to forget.

Dan opens the double oak door. The scent of redstone and hog dung intrudes into my nostrils. The dark room is clamoring with voices. The husky Sunshine stands so close to Dan that her fur pushes against his robe. Each of us holds the reins to one of the hogs; the hog I manage has Fristad tied to it.

I let Cousin walk in and do the dirty work. Rather than walk towards the watchmen at the back of the room where the tunnel entrance is located, he detours towards the counter and motions for some 'stone.

He is quickly presented with a sealed bottle. I was not aware the pub did wholesale. Dan pulls coins from beneath his robe and hands them to the bartender.

He holds the bottle demonstratively as he walks towards me. It is a bottle of rank brew, one of the strongest redstone drinks. "One for the road?" he says.

"Are you out of your mind?" I say.

"Nope," he says sheepishly. He unscrews the cap, tilts the bottle over his head, and takes a big gulp.

"How can you be drinking at a time like this?" I scorn. "We're about to transport a gravely injured man through gang territory, among other horrible things."

"Don't worry. I'm not going to fire magic missiles at anyone, and I am well aware of the gravity of Fristad's injury." Dan takes another gulp.

"You say that now, but the rank hasn't kicked in yet," I warn. I don't bother mentioning that 'magic missile' is not a real spell. Hopefully he meant it in jest.

"You should have a little more faith in me, Jonas." Dan demonstratively puts the bottle of rank in a leather bag hanging from one of the hogs. "I can control myself. I'm a big boy."

I sigh deeply, hoping I wasn't the only reason that Dan put the rank away. "I just wish you would take these sorts of matters more seriously."

Dan says not a word, but instead walks to the back of the room where the watchmen are. Of course he would ignore me like that. The watchmen stare at Dan, frowning threateningly. Dan pulls out a small metal trinket from a pocket, and in an instant they grin widely, as if Dan's a trusted family friend.

Ridiculous.

They of course let us through. I tighten my grip on the reins of my hog and follow Dan to the entrance of a wooden stairwell. Dan has to bend his head down a little to fit inside.

The stairs lead down into a dark, humid space lit only by redstone torches and the occasional lamp. It's especially dark with my goggles on. A few wooden shacks lean against the tunnel walls, but there are no stone buildings or modifications to the tunnel itself. How strange.

The city must have hired mages to ward the walls to keep miners from messing with it. Perhaps if I was still human, I would be able to sense the wards myself, but I have no choice but to ask Dan if I truly want to affirm their existence.

"Do you sense any wards, Cousin?" I ask.

"Very much so," says Dan. "I believe they are against rock penetration and geomorphy. They are strong ones, too. It must have taken years to complete them. Why do you ask?"

"Because I am just as interested in the structure of the tunnel as yourself," I say. "I suspected there was a ward, given the construction of the buildings here."

Much of our journey through the tunnel goes smoothly. We come across two groups of armed men, but both groups ignore us. I can now even see brighter light ahead of us.

But then a group of five people wearing hooded red robes approach us. One of them walks in front of Dan, blocking his path.

"Where do you think you're going?" he says. "This is a military tunnel. Unauthorized entry by civilians is illegal. Under Bluesteel law we are required to arrest you."

"You better watch out," Dan says, "I know a magic missile spell that can knock an ordinary Minecrafter off their feet and propel them five meters away."

What is Dan thinking, threatening another mage with a fairytale spell? He's making us look like a couple of fools!

"We are professional military magi and we outnumber you more than two to one," the man in front says. "Your magic missile spells are no match for us. You'd best cooperate peacefully."

"Is that so?" Dan inquires, a knowing smile barely visible in his shadowed face.

"Daisy, Dustface, search the hogs," says the man in front.

"Aye, aye," one of them says.

"What unprofessional behavior for military magi..." Dan remarks.

"Cousin, what are we going to do about the hogs?" I ask. "You're not seriously going to let them near Fristad and our belongings, are you?"

"Oops. My apologies." Dan lets forth a ball of light from each hand, and they crash into the two hooded folk walking near our hogs. Both of them stumble and bend down, groaning in pain.

The three hooded folk in front of us pull their iron swords from their sheaths. I soon hear the sound of gliding metal behind us.

Dan pulls out his diamond sword, grinning smugly. "Outnumbered but not out-armed, I'm afraid. Jonas, take off your gloves."

I reluctantly do as he says and tuck my gloves into my robe pocket, exposing my sweaty hands to the open air. I can already see my use of ender magic becoming a slippery slope.

"I am a trained combat mage and my friend here is an enderman half-blood," explains Dan. "Given that you five are clearly not mages as you claim to be, I hope you realize that you are at a severe disadvantage. I am now giving you this opportunity to walk away peacefully and let us be on our way."

I curse internally. If these people really aren't mages, then why did Dan bother ordering me to take off my gloves? I am not going to waste the efforts of my suppression on some civilians that pose no threat to us.

"May I ask how you came to that conclusion?" says the man in front, amused.

"It's quite simple, really. A real mage would know that 'magic missile' is not a real spell," Dan says. "It's a name solely used in fairytale stories. Any self-respecting mage would be appalled by the use of the term. Also, real mages don't wear robes quite like those."

Dan's elaborate use of logic is a bad sign. He could have easily figured out they weren't mages by sensing their mana pool. The Rank must be impairing Dan's judgment. This is exactly what I hoped would not happen!

"So, you're one of those academic types? Notch, I hate those," says the man in front. "At least that means you're rich. All the more reason to loot you. Right, guys?"

At this point it's clear that these people don't work for the military. They are no more than dirty thieves.

"Well said," says one of the hooded folk behind us, perhaps only a meter away now.

"Before we make a huge mess here," stalls Dan, "I'll have you know I am a contractor mage. I fulfill services for some organizations you may be familiar with, but I don't take sides. Given that you may need my services in the future, it is in your best interest for us to part peacefully."

"We don't need your help," one of the female hooded folk says. "Ghasted aristocratic scum! Why can't we just kill them and be done with it?"

"Let's roast 'em!"

"Yea!"

"Shut up!" says the man in front. "The only one who gives the orders around here is me. Explain yourself, old man."

"I'm afraid I don't have much else to say. I don't discuss my clients," says Dan.

"I don't like secrets," the man in front says. "Bah, what the heck. I'm tired of waiting. Kill them both! Just don't destroy the potential merchandise."

Balls of flame materialize from the hooded folk's free hands. Turns out they were mages after all, all five of them. Dan made a huge miscalculation.

I feel the heat of the fireballs glance me before an instinctive pulse of energy snaps me into the void. The silver flames bend around my violet aura. My mind grabs onto a space of ground behind the head mage and the world snaps into place.

The light of the tunnel is inverted and strange. I feel oddly calm as my cold fingers slice through the neck beneath the fabric hood.

There is screaming, but I fear it it is my own.

As I teleport behind another hooded figure, I hesitate for a moment. I remember the ranch in Veridale. I realize I am losing an old battle I have fought so hard: a battle to save my humanity, a battle to leave behind the world of magic which has so long haunted me. With every pulse of energy, the cold liquid of ender will seep further into my veins. It won't be much longer until water starts to burn my skin.

But I kill the mage anyway. Surely it is out of necessity.

By the time I teleport behind a third mage, Cousin's sword is already poking though their back. He pulls the sword out, and the mage collapses to the ground, choking. They are the last mage to fall.

You can tell from Cousin's smile that he enjoyed the whole affair.

"Let's not linger here, shall we?" Dan says. "I do miss the daylight."

"If you are so reluctant to stay here, then why do you look like you're planning to put them in a museum?" I remark sarcastically. "You seem to take pleasure in their deaths. It's frightening if I say so myself. Fristad tried to kill me and I was forced to incapacitate him. That's not a matter to smile about, is it?" I argue.

"I simply find their stupidity amusing. They tried to kill us first; they deserved to die."

Sunshine barks nervously.

"Yes, Sunshine, I agree," says Dan, his smile waning. "Let's leave this place."

I sigh. Dan is less sane than usual, but I hold my tongue.

I wish I could blame my failing suppression on Dan's poor judgement, but that wouldn't be fair. If I hadn't made the mistakes that I did, I wouldn't be here in the first place. I am the real reason that my suppression is failing, and I hate myself for that.


End file.
